REVIEW: Tess Parks—Blood Hot (2013)
Optic Nerve's deluxe 2024 reissue takes us back to where it all began for the Toronto artist.
Alan McGee sure knows how to pick a winner. Upon his return to music back in 2013, he made the then-unknown Toronto artist Tess Parks his first signing to his new 359 imprint, recognising her “smouldering voice” and “gauzy psychedelic sound” before anyone else.
The result was Blood Hot, an instantly compelling 11-track launchpad for her entire career. Just a few bars of opening track Someday and it’s all there: the ideal opening track. The simple, building riff, that voice. 2 minutes 40 and you’re already in. I’d imagine seeing all these early songs in a basement dive somewhere (I’m seeing St. Moritz in Soho) and just instantly know a long career was ahead of her. She clearly had everything already: the look, the vibe, the voice and the songs.
It goes on throughout the album; that darkness, those simple riffs, the low vocal delivery, an atmospheric sparseness. When I Am Young brings that haunting repetition, driving home the point.
You can totally hear why Anton Newcombe wanted to team up with her straight after this. It already felt like she was a spiritual part of the BJM family before they even met. That’s not to say Blood Hot is a shameless rip-off of their sound, but certainly the shared DNA of that lugubrious approach to the guitar work tells you all you need to know.
But if I’m going to be picky, then it’s easy to let your attention drift off a little as the record progresses. The good old fashioned mid-album lull kicks in well and truly on Walk Behind Your House, kind of stuck in its own rut, without a melodic hook to lift it out.
This is classic first album syndrome, where the deeper cuts can expose an artist that hasn’t had time to build up a body of top-class work yet, and certain songs start to feel like retreads of other songs, and these similar song structures with a similar vibe make them blend into one another. This takes the momentum out of the record a tad, before we get to the roaring finisher Love Around. If you were going to be brutal, you’d probably say this is an excellent EP padded out to LP length. Her best days were ahead of her, no doubt, but Blood Hot served a vital role in getting Tess Parks established.
But kudos to Optic Nerve for going the extra mile in celebrating this release. Originally it didn’t even come out on vinyl at all (gasp), but once they picked it up a few years later, various reissues have kept it available, culminating in this gatefold sleeved gold vinyl edition, complete with a booklet of lyrics and notes covering 2009-2013: effectively the genesis of this record. A lovely photo is also housed within the sleeve, so if you’re going to get this album, get this version. It sounds great too, if such things are important to you.
