tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-64155032022182523602024-03-06T00:01:51.406+00:00Astounded by Sound!Eclectic Music for the Mind & BodyRoger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.comBlogger381125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-66985039479279269532019-12-22T14:53:00.000+00:002019-12-22T17:55:02.154+00:002019, the insanity grows...Odd title for an annual music review, but them's the times. With these words I aim to provide you with an escape from the creeping madness, which by the time you read this will have crystallised still further, or maybe it's still chasing itself round the kitchen garden wearing nowt but outsized bloomers on its head, who knows? Thank fuck for the music, is all I can say.<br />
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Expanding on last year's more informal layout, I will hopefully tempt you to dip your toes into the multi-coloured waters of my strange musical pond, as I witter on a bit about those albums that made me sit up and take notice, mostly in a good way.<br />
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Here's a handy playlist that includes a track from most of the albums mentioned below, which saves you having to read it all, I suppose!<br />
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In roughly chronological order of release, here goes...<br />
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We start the year with an album I missed from 2018, namely <b>Marianne Faithful - Negative Capability</b>, which oozes the class and dignity of one of life's survivors. 2019 was prodded into action by <b>Free Human Zoo - No Wind Tonight</b>, a new take on jazz rock, and <b>Stephan Thelen</b>, he of tri-tone monsters Sonar, whose solo album <b>Fractal Guitar</b> sounded much as you might expect, but still did the trick.<br />
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In September we went to see an intriguing idea called The Utopia Strong (more of that band further down... ), who were supporting <b>Teeth Of The Sea</b>, a punishingly loud live act that bludgeoned their fine album <b>Wraith</b> into the mostly willing audience with untrammeled glee. This band and those of similar outlook are naturals to be soundtracking the end of days, should the apocalyptic scenarios of soon come ecological and/or economic disaster prove correct. Not for Teeth Of The Sea a cosy nostalgic worldview through rose-tinted spectacles, oh no. This music tells tales from the beyond, and as a bonus is beyond classification. Brutal and beautiful at one and the same time.<br />
A different prospect live, where they seem to be a "rock band for clubbers" who like their music to deploy insane bowel-loosening levels of low-end volume. The only gig I left before the end this year! I must be getting old.<br />
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A slight return for Talk Talk luminary Paul Webb, as <b>Rustin Man</b>, on his first outing in a mere 16 years with <b>Drift Code</b>, a very English record, from a slightly altered space. Robert Wyatt would approve.<br />
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And now we come to one of the year's highlights with <b>Lost Crowns - Every Night Something Happens</b>. I have already written plenty about this band and their album (see <a href="https://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2019/01/11/lost-crowns-every-night-something-happens/" target="_blank">HERE</a> and <a href="https://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2019/02/12/lost-crowns-ham-legion-wryneck/" target="_blank">HERE</a> if interested), and some of it made a kind of sense, much like the album in question. "Let Loving Her Be Everything... is leaping around in the kitchen in a peculiar collection of wrong time signatures while I’m attempting to prepare tea, headbanging furiously to THAT riff. I’ve seen this played live, I know what it can do where yoga takes twice the time." You have been warned.<br />
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A duo from Belgium now, both helmed by a guitarist of some note by the name of Michel Delville. First up is <b>The Godel Codex - Oak</b>, which is 21st century artrock carved from a rapidly receding glacier. Well, it would be if Belgium had mountains. Exploratory cosmic surfing from Brussels, via Canterbury, through an industrial electronic filter, with love. Then we have <b>The Wrong Object - Into The Herd</b>, wherein Michel Delville's psychedelic fusion band get down right deep into the groove and turn the lightshow on.<br />
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The new era of <b>Gong</b> goes from strength to strength, and <b>The Universe Also Collapses</b> took the pothead pixies along to the Knifeworld party to produce a very trippy hybrid. Where does Knifeworld end and Gong start is the question no-one is asking?! <b>Motorpsycho</b> followed up last year's triumphal The Tower with <b>The Crucible</b>, which is a tad looser, and definitely heavier, and it does the business in classic Motorpsycho style.<br />
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Long-running altered state Americana exponents <b>Mercury Rev</b> came up with a cover of <b>Bobby Gentry's The Delta Sweete</b>, which introduces a whole new audience to a classic outsider's album, especially this side of the Pond where I'm guessing 90% and upwards of the buyers of Mercury Rev's latest had never heard nor even heard of the original record, me included. The Rev filter the countryfied Americana of the original through their familiar psychedelic gauze, using a succession of guest female vocalists, but making it very much their own record in the process. A fine return to form.<br />
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A 14-headed beast by the name of <b>Fire! Orchestra</b> fell upon Earth from the drinking halls of Valhalla, gifting us mere mortals music by the longship-load. <b>Arrival</b> is breathtaking in its scope, and for good measure includes a sublime cover of Chic's At Last I Am Free, which I primarily associate with Robert Wyatt as I heard his version from 1978's Rock Bottom before I was aware of the original.<br />
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Three vastly different albums now: <b>Daniel O'Sullivan - Folly</b> gave us twelve sumptuous and magickal songs from the multi-talented musician with Ulver connections that will caress your weary soul. <b>The Hedvig Mollestad Trio - Smells Funny</b> is the loudest record in this list, and Hedvig's monster guitar rock from the jazz clubs of Valhalla will loosen yer fillings. Luvvly. Lastly, and in complete contrast, we have <b>Michael Chapman - True North</b>. Maybe doesn't quite hit the heights 2017's celebratory 50, but the veteran folk growler still makes the art of engaging and relevant songwriting sound effortless, creating a very listenable album in the process.<br />
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A couple from the Prog Pond now, starting with <b>Tim Bowness - Flowers At The Scene.</b> Full-on but cliché-free modern prog rock from the diminutive but forceful "David Cassidy of prog". To clarify, I mean for his breathy crooning, not that he gets knickers thrown at him by obssessive female fans. That's still to come, but judging by his ever-growing profile it won't be long. The other is <b>Isildur's Bane & Peter Hammill - In Amazonia</b>. Having made an album with Steve Hogarth, the unashamedly prog Swedes now team up with one of the heavyweights, and the greatest lyricist of the originals, one Peter Hammill. It's far too tempting to say that this is what a new incarnation of VdGG might sound like, so I just did.<br />
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Meanwhile, back in Belgium, a strange but beautiful beast from the never less than interesting Guy Segers of Univers Zéro fame, by the name of <b>The Eclectic Maybe Band</b> gave the world their <b>Reflection In A Mœbius Ring Mirror</b>. Here, Segers surrounds himself with a cast of seasoned players and makes an album that is as out there and as genuinely progressive as you'd expect, while being entirely listenable. A contender!<br />
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Two albums as different from one another and from the previous album in this scattergun list that effortlessly reflects my obviously superb Catholic tastes, are <b>Ebony Steel Band - Pan Machine</b>, and <b>Spellcasters - Music From The Anacostia Delta</b>. The former injects Krafwerk's glacial classic with a large helping of Caribbean soul food for the ears, covering Man Machine on steel drums, and it works! The latter finds three American dudes on Telecasters rocking out, probably sporting acres of denim. These two tie for Fun Album of The Year.<br />
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Hip thang of the year was <b>black midi</b> and their album <b>Schlagenheim</b> had the Shoreditch beard gel consumers bobbing their man buns about in a studied cool approximation of orgasmic frenzy. Proof that BRIT School graduates don't just make pretty pop. They are indeed VERY hip, but that's probably not their fault. Angular, spiky, reminds me of early Wire, but it has a wily presence all its own. Might be too clever for its own good, and unlike the other deliberately clever album in this list (Lost Crowns) shows little evidence of a sense of humour, and takes itself a tad too seriously. The interesting question is how they follow this up!<br />
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WARNING (and general rant... ) - don't buy the CD version, it's probably the worst "designed" cover I have ever come across, if Amazon reviews are to be believed. The lyric sheet is apparently stuck under the shrink wrapping on the outside of CD-single case, and won't fit inside the case! Rough Trade are obviously run by kids who don't understand that the CD is a perfectly acceptable format being deliberately killed off by the major labels - no manufacturing costs in streaming, it's all about profit. This is not a good thing.<br />
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Another trio of releases that cover an awful lot of stylistic ground is headed up by <b>North Sea Radio Orchestra - Folly Bololey</b>. A joyous reworking of Robert Wyatt's classic solo album Rock Bottom, plus some gorgeous extras, with John Greaves and Annie Barbazza. If it doesn't make you smile inside, your soul has had too much of life's botox.<br />
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<b>Flying Lotus</b> came up with a sprawling follow up to 2014's psychedelic extravaganza You're Dead, entitled <b>Flamagra</b>. Unlike that album, which wore its early Soft Machine influence quite openly, and put it through all sorts of modern production trickery to produce a dense trip hop stew, this time Stephen Ellison flings open the stable doors and the horses stampede their new-found freedom across lysergic plains of dayglo cinematic vistas. Or summat. In a word, epic! The last panel of this ill-matched triptych is <b>Elephant9 - Psychedelic Backfire I & II</b>. Keyboard wizard Ståle Storløkken, best known for his many collaborations with countrymen Terje Rypdal and Motorpsycho, and for leading his own jazz-improv group Supersilent, has another project named Elephant9 who are a trio consisting of his keyboards, plus bass and drums. They groove like muvvas on this double live release where they lock in to some tremendous ass-kicking grooves. On II they are joined by Reine Fiske, the guitarist from psych rockers Dungen, and things get very hot in the kitchen, oh yes! Live album of the year, no question!<br />
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Ståle Storløkken also makes a guest appearance on the weighty jazz-prog-improv collision <b>Q</b> by <b>Krokofant</b>, an album guaranteed to rattle yer ornaments. It is probably time to declare those flawless purveyors of sonic goodness, Norway's Rune Grammofon as my label of the year, given their many entries in this collection. Staying out on a limb with a sublime suite of chamber-rock music is the welcome return of Spanish band <b>October Equus</b> with <b>Presagios</b>, their first release in some six years, and a fabulous album it is!<br />
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Individualism, that's what attracts me where music is concerned, and four fellas with little regard for convention are up next. First we have the latest album from that insane NZ dwelling ex-pat Scouser chilli muncher (retired) Matt "It's Our Year" (probably, curses) Deacon and his also ex-pat Scouser LA-based drummer friend and colleague Chris Jago, who under the moniker <b>The Bob Lazar Story</b> inflicted <b>Vanquisher</b> upon us unsuspecting fools. Vanquisher is a triumph over a likely disaster involving fried guitar, smoochy electric piano, jazz fusion, weird electronica, and a hilarious interlude of frenzied shouting entitled "Tony". As Eno once said "Burning Arseholes Give You So Much More".<br />
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Meanwhile, back in the Northern Hemisphere, Our Man In Moscow, <b>Emmett Elvin</b> described to us heathen <b>The End Of Music</b>, which plays out as a headlong rush into the unknown, and is Emmett's most complete work to date, charging along with an almost manic intent. LOOK OUT!! CLIFF!!!...<br />
After that, what better way to reflect on the crazy times we live in than to lose yourself in <b>Charlie Cawood</b>'s understated but epic <b>Blurring Into Motion</b>? Probably the most cerebral offering in this list, Charlie's beautiful and introspective opus takes on a voyage into our deepest thought processes. The ego is left behind.<br />
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Incidentally, all those last three are on Bad Elephant Music, home for the genre-war refugees.<br />
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Long running jazzists <b>Led Bib</b> annoyed a critic or two, who really should know better, by taking a left turn to incorporate the distinctive tones of Sharron Fortnam on the highly engaging <b>It's Morning</b>. The album launch show, held in a cinema, was an otherworldly experience.<br />
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Prog metal - y'all know how I love it, right? Well, these next three pitched their hats into the ring... <b>Tool</b> returned after 13 years with a rather strange and flat affair entitled <b>Fear Inoculum </b>that never really gets out of second gear, and lasts waay too long. No doubt it topped all sorts of lists, because, well I dunno... Less well known but taking the kinds of risks with this often hidebound genre that Tool have long forgotten about are <b>Leprous</b> with <b>Pitfalls</b>. They appear to be mining the same dark pop seam recently uncovered by Ulver, who are the most unpredictable band (this is a good thing btw) ever to have been associated with the genre that for the most part I find about as inspiring as a Michael Gove speech. Ulver are of course, genius writ large, and on this showing Leprous are not far behind. The third act in this threeway (no chickens were harmed) is <b>Opeth</b> with <b>In Cauda Venenum</b>, in which Mikael Åkerfeldt out-Wilsons his old mate in the non-generic application of vintage instrumentation department. It seems that after dropping the stale growly prog metal style a few years and albums back, that they have finally found the pantaloons large enough to fit comfortably.<br />
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That's enuff "prog" and "metal". Back in the land of the odd we came across the self-titled debut from <b>The Utopia Strong</b>, where 80s housewives' favourite Steve Davis (for it is he) messes around with a modular synth and puts his and his bandmates' reps on the line and comes up smelling of Kosmische cologne. This is far better than you might think, and live it was quite entrancing.<br />
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<b>Bent Knee - You Know What They Mean</b> is art-rock and then some, and a band at the height of their powers. The British equivalent are the rapidly maturing <b>A Formal Horse</b>, whose <b>A Man From The Council With A Flamethrower</b>, as well as being Album Title of The Year, shows a band who have progressed (eek!) in leaps and bounds from their previous EP releases. Keep an eye on that equine!<br />
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Sheffield jazz/avant luminary Martin Archer got the conceptual shakes with his <b>Anthropology Band</b>'s fine double blast of Miles-inspired tuneage, and <b>Sonar </b>made an album as a quintet with <b>David Torn</b> called <b>Tranceportation Volume One</b>, which took us on a near-familiar journey. I also dabbled in the folk world, with Irish Gothic-folk practitioners <b>Lankum</b> and their <b>Livelong Day</b>, whose darkly impressionistic world is in stark contrast with the more direct and literal style of <b>Richard Dawson</b>'s <b>2020</b>, a record that pulls no punches, reflecting these stark times back at us.<br />
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<b>Stick Men - PANAMERICA</b> is a mahoosive five-album document of the Sticky beast's journey through cocaine bandit country, with violinist David Cross. A total headfuck, in a good way! <b>no-man - Love You To Bits </b>ends a busy year for Tim Bowness with the long awaited return of his and Steven Wilson's long-dormant musical project. I didn't expect EDM though! I reckon the Tunesome Twosome are another pair of musical artists who have been listening to Ulver's latest incarnation. This is not a bad thing. It also might be what Mr Wilson wants to do under his own name but is worried might lose him his burgeoning crossover audience. Possibly.<br />
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Back in the mainstream, modern urban soul giant <b>Michael Kiwanuka</b>'s third album, entitled simply <b>Kiwanuka</b> takes the pulse of modern urban living, and has a gritty relevance combined with deep tunes, in a manner unseen since What's Going On. Yes, it's that good. <b>Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - Ghosteen</b> is an album of love and hope after loss and grief, and Cave's songwriting gets better with every release. If ever proof be needed of the power of lyrics as poetry, this is it. <b>Underworld - Drift Series</b> was a project to release something new every week for a year, which perhaps inevitably took on a life of its own. The hour long sampler available gives you a miniscule peek into the year's finest conceptual shenanigans. There is a sprawling 7 CD box set version, including all the related films, and you can find all of it online, including the psychedelically mesmerising 47-minute collaboration with Australian tri-tone improv legends The Necks. Stunning!<br />
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2019 - a year of many decent albums, but nothing head and shoulders above the rest. Tying in a three-way (the chicken took charge) for my <b>Album of The Year</b> are <b>Lost Crowns - Every Night Something Happens</b>, <b>North Sea Radio Orchestra with Annie Barbazza & John Greaves - Folly Bololey</b>, and <b>Michael Kiwanuka - Kiwanuka</b>. Oh, and <b>Emmett Elvin's End Of Music</b> has to be mentioned as it made my 10 best of the decade! I had a different hat on then. This is all bollocks obviously.<br />
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Other stuff...<br />
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<b>Reissue of the year</b> - <b>Van der Graaf Generator - Aerosol Grey Machine</b><br />
Thanks to Vicky at Esoteric for sending me a physical copy of this lavishly tooled box set commemorating the 50th anniversary of the release of the iconic prog explorers' first album. If ever the overused review word "sumptuous" applies, then this is the baby!<br />
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One fails to appreciate from the pdfs of the artwork and the book that came with the review download what a work of art this is. Anyone who doubts the rightful place of the vinyl LP as the pinnacle of music product expressed as an artform needs to see the LP contained herein, housed as it is in a gatefold sleeve adorned with the never used original artwork, and their curmudgeonly opinion should be shifted. If not, then frankly, there's no hope for them, the Philistines!<br />
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The rest of the package, especially the 12 x 12 book crammed with photos and a new essay by Sid Smith, ain't too shabby either. Well done Peter Hammill and all at Esoteric Recordings involved in making this lovely objet d'art.<br />
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<b>Gig of The Year</b><br />
Koenji Hyakkei - The Lexington, London 12th May 2019<br />
Soul, humanity, staggering complexity, and dancing, all at once! Fabulous UK debut for long-running Japanese Zeuhl exponents saw many mouths left agape in wonder!<br />
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<b>Worst Album Cover of The Year</b><br />
A new category, because I couldn't let Big Big Train's Grand Tour album cover pass without comment! But wait, what's this? I'm afraid BBT's cheesy veneer is trumped (heheh... ) by the album cover for <b>Tom Slatter</b>'s <b>Demon</b>, which looked like it had all of a minute's thought, and a budget of 5p. Knowing this Slatter fellow's arch ways (rather than his archways, which I'm sure are probably Gothic), it was probably deliberate. Still, KILL IT WITH FIRE!!!!<br />
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If you've read this far, you've probably read other examples of my torturous sentences in 2019 and not lost the will to live. For that, I admire your perseverance, and thank you most humbly. Now, go and do summat useful with your time, and try not to let the prospect of endless Johnson put you off.</div>
<br />Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-13172548054914170042018-12-28T15:46:00.000+00:002018-12-28T23:51:39.876+00:002018 was a year, here is a list...<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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It's December 28th, and I have only just started typing this. You see, I wasn't going to bother doing my usual "Best Of" thing this year because my mojo has disappeared so far south, it's shacked up with a colony of penguins off the Megellan Strait in Chile, and I am quite enjoying my current extended hiatus from churning out reams of wurdz that no-one reads.<br />
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However (you knew there was a "however" coming, didn't you?), my good friend and wrangler of guitars, Mr Matt Stevens, posted this on his page:<br />
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""We’re so pleased so many people are discovering the band thanks to the end of year lists. Cheers for listening to weird stuff 😊"<br />
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It made me think that even if one person picks up on something I mention in my version of The List, then it's worth it. I was also inspired to once more take up the virtual Sheaffer by the typically po-faced ranting of a well-known interwebs music journo against The List wherein he gave reasons, in the form of...a list, as to why end-of-year lists are WRONG, and he is RIGHT - no change there, then. Cor, such cutting i-ron-ee, eh, how can I possibly compete? Why, by delving into my small but perfectly formed List of 2018, that's how. Read on, start a revolution, or put the kettle on!<br />
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This time I will try to keep it relatively short'n'sweet, with the year's highlights in rough chronological order followed by a straight list of those albums that rattled my cage without picking the lock. Right, here goes...<br />
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The beginning of the year saw the hep cats groovin' to the big fun pop-prog produced by Norwegians <b>Dobbeltgjenger</b> on their album <b>Limbohead</b>. This is music for folk who answer the door wearing nowt but a shocking pink merkin and a leery grin.<br />
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Unapologetically ROCK, Poland's <b>Weedpecker</b> with their third album saw any hints of pretension given a good kicking, right down to the album title, <b>III</b>. This Brobdanigian stoned colossus tramples everything underfoot, in between being rilly, rilly chilled, maaan. From the reefer-stewn deserts of the hinterlands of Warsaw. Possibly.<br />
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Changing tack into more considered waters, we visit the shores of a Swiss lake where we find an unlikely but inspirational hook-up. Swiss tri-tonal minimalists <b>Sonar</b> get down with avant-guitar slinger David Torn and produce one of the best records of the year in <b>Vortex</b>.<br />
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<b>Cheer-Accident</b> are veteran dwellers of the far flung fringes of modern music, and <b>Fades</b> is their 19th album, and it shows as much zest as a lot of debuts. The Chicagoans this time come up with some deep pop moves, including <i>Monsters</i> which has a relentlessness about it that The Fall would have been proud of. They are much more polished than the wilful Mancunians, of course! Oh...and Sacha Mullins' vocal on <i>I'm Just Afraid</i> are a delight, and worth the entry price alone. Sticking with the avant fringes, <b>Jack O'The Clock</b> are a band even more obscure but no less beguiling. <b>Repetitions Of The Old City II</b> is this year's model. Veering from avant chamber-folk to complex art-pop, sometimes within the same song, this unique band is led by a musical wizard by the name of Damon Waitkus from within a fairy grotto in the mist-laden forests of Erewhon, and they just get better and better with each release.<br />
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I'm told this is "smooth jazz", but categories are bunk. <b>Kamasi Washington</b> is the name and <b>Heaven & Earth</b> is the album. Unlike another recent(ish) album of the same name, the grandiose title here finds itself given a true vision, and is treated with suitable respect. You will also find sweeping arrangements and bags of swing, not to mention soul by the bucketload, something I find lacking in that other jazz/fusion band currently filling halls wherever they go. While jazz purists might consider both Kamasi Washington and Snarky Puppy to be coffee table jazz for folk who don't really like jazz, give me the raw humanity of Mr Washington's combo and the odd duff note they are prone to in a live setting over the clinical technical perfection of the Puppies all week long, daddio.<br />
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Oh, and whose effin stoopid idea was it to seal, yes actually seal, the bonus disc inside the middle panel of the CD case? Everybody knew it was there, so why make folk destroy the damn packaging to get at it? Apparently it was similarly hidden in the vinyl version, which given the vinyl LP's general allergy to sharp objects probing about in its vicinity has to rank as the most coke-fuelled marketing mistake this year. Twats.<br />
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And... breathe out... Well, there had to be one actual "prog" album in here, and <b>Regal Worm</b>'s glorious <b>Pig Views</b> is it. A double album on shocking pink vinyl? Yes please, mista. Possibly the most gloriously fulsome sound of the year. Without descending into cliche anywhere and without sounding anything like Genesis or Yes, it's still "prog", and a bloody good job too!<br />
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I never thought I'd be putting an <b>Arctic Monkeys</b> album in one of my lists, but prejudices are there to be overcome, say I! <b>Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino</b>, in which Sheffield's favourite sons complete their transformation from awkward and frankly irritating agit-pop oiks into a world of arty ultra-sophistication seen through swirls of Gauloise smoke from an observation deck on the Moon, is something of a classy revelation. Any band that generates 30% 1* reviews from its hidebound fans on Amazon must be doing something right. Fans don't like "their" band taking risks, doncha know!<br />
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Back in the land of exotic fruit, how about Sheffield's (third time in this list - must be summat in the water, 'appen) <b>Orchestra Of The Upper Atmosphere</b>, and their fourth mash up of the Kosmische, world music, and general avant strangeitude, entitled <b>θ4</b>? This time they've reigned in their excesses and restricted themselves to a mere near-eighty minutes of music on one CD. In places you can dance to it. Jah Wobble would approve.<br />
<br />
<b>All Them Witches</b> had the keyboards take a back seat on <b>Atw</b> which allowed guitarist Ben McLeod to fling riffs and melody lines into the gaps with swaggering panache. Dig that groove, rainy day, dream away...<br />
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Another complete change of direction sees us getting all cerebral with Edinburgh's <b>North Atlantic Oscillation</b> and their fourth album <b>Grind Show</b>, here's what I said when I made notes at the time -<br />
If The Beatles were a synth pop band with a propensity for grandiose arrangements, they might have written <i>Spinning Top</i>. Following track <i>Sirens</i> is monster, o yes... and then there's <i>Downriver</i>. Heck, just go give it a listen. Sample heavy - the many brass samples are a delight - and thankfully uncategorisable, this is one of those albums that I thought had passed me by, but Phil H wouldn't let it lie. And so it crept into my ears and went KABOOM! PLAY LOUD.<br />
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Staying in the land of chin-stroking, <b>Thumpermonkey</b> gave us <b>Make Me Young etc</b>. From a whisper to a scream, the ideas on display here are neither colourless nor green, but occasionally they are indeed furious, to quote their previous album which seems like an aeon ago. This new album is bigger than the largest thing you can imagine, and expanding all the time.<br />
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Finally, a truly wonderful racket to caress your ears at year's end, namely the new album from American sonic adventurers <b>Far Corner</b> that goes by the descriptive title of <b>Risk</b>. Who needs a lead a guitar? Not these folk, who make a thrilling amalgam of chamber rock and avant stylings with a truly devilish panache. Lovely!<br />
...<br />
<br />
Mentioned in dispatches, again in rough chronological order of release:<br />
Ashley Reaks - The Earth Sings Swan Again, Vantomme - Vegir, Tautologic - re:Psychle, 7Shades - Monumental Midden, Not A Good Sign - Icebound, Ryley Walker - Deafman Glance, Jon Hassell - Listening To Pictures, David Kollar & Arve Henriksen - Illusion Of A Separate World, Det Skandaløse Orkester - Tenk om noen ser deg, Voivod - The Wake, Sterbus - Real Estate/Fake Inverno, The Fierce & The Dead - The Euphoric. King Buffalo - Longing To Be The Mountain, Gosta Berlings Saga - Et Ex, Alec K. Redfearn & The Eyesores - The Opposite, Forgas Band Phenomena - L'Oreille Electrique<br />
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<br /></div>
... and of course, there are at least 700 albums released in 2018 I've not heard yet that would have made this list.<br />
...<br />
<br />
It remains for me to thank Jez, Bob, & Rob at TPA for putting up with me, Phil L for being great company and as mad as a as a as a... spoon, Phil W for allowing himself to be deafened at the many dives I've dragged him into over the year, and Phil H for being a mad bastard no longer 200 yards away, but 300 miles away. That's a lot of Phils, innit? All Two Els, too - what are the chances of that? Oh, and ta muchly to any and all of you lot who have read this far and probably also read my increasingly intermittent music-related wibble on the interwebs, be it here, at TPA or anywhere else. May 2019 not be quite as scary as most of us with any gumption know it will be!<br />
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Now... put yer knickers on, and make a cup of tea.Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-28725616324081143162018-11-17T18:09:00.002+00:002018-11-17T18:09:31.792+00:00The MOJO CD - The Best of 2018<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Here we are again, another year nearly gone by, another "Best of" CD to have fun with. They seem to come out earlier every year!<br />
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<b>Idles - Great</b><br />
Bristolian flavours of the year dip into their grandad's post-punk collection, add in some Iggy, both vocally, and via the chaos at their gigs, and come up with 2018's attempt to breathe life into the rock corpse. If I was 18 I'd love this racket. I quite like it at 307, as it happens. OK, this band have one idea, but they do it very well, and having one idea never did Coldplay any harm, did it? They even woke up Later for 5 minutes earlier in the year, for which many thanks are due.<br />
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<b>Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever - An Air Conditioned Man</b><br />
Another band who take their cues from the explosion in sounds that happened when the dust settled after the Punk Wars, this time from their Antipodean ancestors from that time. This song is giving me Go Betweens plus added swagger. Not bad at all. Oh, and definitely Band Name Of The Year!<br />
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<b>Elvis Costello - Stripping Paper</b><br />
Only a wordsmith as accomplished as Mr McManus could write a surprisingly warm self-examination ostensibly about decorating. He may be mellowing with age, but with The Attractions.... sorry, Imposters behind him he can still come up with the goods.<br />
This song is superbly recorded,the sonics on this track are sublime, and the bass sound alone is worth the entry fee. Otherwise talented but cloth-eared new artists (Syd Arthur and Ryley Walker spring to mind) take note.<br />
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<b>Cat Power - Woman</b><br />
I've heard of Cat Power, and I'm vaguely aware of her feminist credentials. Knowing that means that this ditty is deffo not aimed an gnarled old scrote like me. She sings "I'm a woman" a lot on a decent enough pop outing.<br />
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<b>Christine And The Queens - The Walker</b><br />
Another one that passes by my bathchair, more hurriedly than Cat Power as it is driven by an annoyingly obvious electronic rhythm that a child could have come up with. The song itself is pretty forgettable too.<br />
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<b>Young Fathers - Border Girl</b><br />
Another new one for me, this lot make an electronic bass-driven racket that I can imagine Peter Gabriel making now if he'd been born in 1993.<br />
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<b>Low - Disarray</b><br />
Veteran miserablists go glam, but quite slowly, obviously. Actually not bad. After all this computer music I'm beginning to long for some humans playing instruments.<br />
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<b>Kamasi Washington - Will You Sing</b><br />
Humans, you say? Well, it doesn't get much more organic than this, from MOJO's #1 album of 2018. Kamasi leads the way in the age of nu-jazz. More soul in this one song than an entire album of puppies.<br />
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<b>Fatoumata Diawarra - Nterini</b><br />
Italy-based Malian (good luck with that, you might need it) singer with connections to Damon Albarn via his African Express adventures. Familiar African female vocal gymnastics and modern rhythms combine to make a finger-poppin' pop choon. Further investigation needed, as I've always been hypnotised by the African beat.<br />
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<b>Eleanor Friedberger - Everything</b><br />
Passable synth-pop. Inoffensive.<br />
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<b>Gaz Coombes - Oxygen Mask</b><br />
I have toyed with buying Mr Coombes' highly praised latest solo album, it being recommended by a mate as well as the press. This particular track is a fine example of singer-songwriter melancholic reflection without getting maudlin, with a great arrangement thrown in for good measure. Another one I will have to check out, methinks.<br />
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<b>Ry Cooder - Straight Street</b><br />
Mr Cooder and his guitar. Not much more to be said really. If you know the name you know how it pans out. If you don't you must be under 40, and a treasure trove awaits. This is where Americana came from.<br />
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<b>Spiritualized - Here It Comes (The Road) Let's Go</b><br />
Stonesy blues number from Jason's twenty-one-year comedown. It seems Primal Scream have have a rival.<br />
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<b>Gwenno - Hi A Shoellyas Liv A Dhagrow</b><br />
Celtic rebel Gwenno Saunders' first album was sung in Welsh, and apparently the follow-up is in Cornish. Breathy vocals singing a song about which goes on first, the cream or the jam. I may have made that up. The music has a woozy psychedelic pop soundtrack feel, which complements the wilful obscurantism of the lyrics to anyone born east of the Devon border, and probably to most pasty munchers, too. Actually rather alluring.<br />
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<b>Maisha - Osiris</b><br />
MOJO bigs up this London band as the closest thing we have to Kamasi Washington, big praise indeed. They're right too, by the sound of this. Yet another one waiting to snap at my wallet.Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-68137504416756959752018-09-25T22:26:00.001+01:002018-09-25T22:26:50.750+01:00Space-time continuum disruption, daddio! (Vol 2)Amazingly, a volume two of this nonsense appears, so soon after volume one too! Whodathunkit?<br />
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<b>The Who - Live at Leeds</b><br />
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The second album in my occasional series is another I have never owned, and for good reason, as I have never liked it, or so my memory thought. I suppose I got off on the wrong foot with this one from day one, my mate's older cousin finding much mirth in my naive assuming that the title of his new purchase by The 'Oo meant that the band lived in the Yorkshire city. I was only 12, is my excuse!<br />
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This may have clouded my judgement, as I seem to recall that Pete Townshend spent most of the album proving he isn't a lead guitarist. To be fair the episodes of noodling are kept to fast and furious minimum, most of the time he's just chopping away in that familiar rhythm guitar style of his, rather well it has to be said.<br />
<br />
The conventional wisdom is that this is the best live album ever. Well it's far too late for me to even begin to work that one out, but one thing I find odd is the track selection. At a mere 37 minutes long, the album contains three cover versions on the rather short 15 minute first side of the original LP, and side two ends with the throwaway Bo Diddley rip off <i>Magic Bus</i>, when the band by this point had accumulated a pile of much stronger self-penned material that they could have included. <i>Tommy</i> was played in full at the gig I believe.<br />
<br />
I suppose they had to include the near quarter hour long sprawling mess of <i>My Generation</i>, it being the expected climax of the gig. Expanded here to include parts of other songs, and Townshend leading some general messing about, it seems the band had taken a leaf out of the new kids on the superstar block Led Zeppelin's book, and that band's excesses on <i>Dazed And Confused</i>, always a track I skip on Zep live albums. All that's missing here is a violin bow. However, I am thankful for small mercies, as at least <i>Live At Leeds</i> doesn't contain a drum solo!<br />
<br />
Long-form wigouts although the flavour of the day didn't suit The Who, who were always song-oriented, and some damn good ones they had too. Shame more of them are not on <i>Live At Leeds. </i>Star of the album is John Entwistle whose thunderous and dexterous bass playing stops it falling apart as Townshend and Moon try to outdo each other in the splenetic fury stakes.<br />
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I listened to this album twice for the purposes of writing this, and that's probably doubled the number of times I have heard it in full since the early 70s. In conclusion, it's not as bad as I remembered, but I won't be rushing to buy it. The best live album ever is <i>Space Ritual</i> by the way.<br />
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Thanks to my mate and similarly opinionated music-head Leo Trimming, without whom, etc...Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-79183328622373803772018-09-16T11:19:00.001+01:002018-09-16T14:37:51.030+01:00Space-time continuum disruption, daddio! (Vol.1)Hi there<br />
It's been a while since I posted anything here, so all my audience, all three of them, have wandered off over there somewhere, ne'er to return. The only visitors to this blog now are bots, worming away in a futile imitation of real life...or summat.<br />
<br />
Anyway...this here thing will be an intermittent series of revisits to ancient records that have been gathering dust and spiders in my memory. Some may have been significant to my musical and sundry other forms of development, some will not. First up is:<br />
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<b>Uriah Heep - Wonderworld</b><br />
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This is an album I had largely forgotten about, until I happened across a thread on Farcebook discussing Uriah Heep's new album. They're still going? Blimey, Mick Box must be about 107! As is the nature of these things, the discussion meandered and ventured into discussing this album.<br />
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Released in 1974 it was the Heep's seventh album, and the last with what would come to be regarded as their most consistent (you can't use a word like "classic" where a band this lumpen are concerned!) line up, as sadly bassist Gary Thain was shortly to become a victim of his long addiction to H. If we are to believe Wikipedia, the band handled his problems with Yes-like sensitive pragmatism!<br />
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"During his last tour in the United States with Uriah Heep, Thain suffered an electric shock at the Moody Coliseum in Dallas, Texas on 15 September 1974, and was seriously injured. Due to his drug addiction he was not able to perform properly, and was fired by the band in early 1975".<br />
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I never actually owned a copy of Wonderworld, a mate recorded it on cassette for me, and I am now listening to it (on YouTube I hasten to add) for the first time in at least four decades. Gawd, this takes me back!<br />
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Taken on its own it's not a bad album, although very much of its time and not particularly memorable. Where it falls down is that by 1974 Heep had hit on a formula, and it sounds like a fading shadow of what went before. It sounds a tad tired, a rehash of past glories.<br />
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Also by 1974 my musical tastes were broadening fast, having succumbed to the educational delights of John Peel. Heep's somewhat plodding straight ahead rhythms and Byron's and Hensley's sixth form poetry-as-lyrics now belonged to an age when I was but a child.<br />
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I got as far as <i>Something Or Nothing</i>, track six of nine, so I did quite well. By then it was giving me a headache so I had to turn it off.<br />
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Expect the next installment soon... or not.<br />
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<i>Thanks to Jan Erik Liljeström for the Heep thread that inspired me to do this!</i><br />
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Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-41970471757204645762018-05-17T14:06:00.003+01:002018-05-17T14:12:56.281+01:00Spock's Beard - Noise Floor<div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="9jh7" data-offset-key="ep9bc-0-0">
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<span data-offset-key="ep9bc-0-0"><span data-text="true">This band may well be Les Grands Fromages of American prawg rawk, and I thought it would be good to use their new album as an indicator of why I need to stop doing this reviewing thing for a while.</span></span><br />
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<span data-offset-key="6pf6e-0-0"><span data-text="true">I managed to sit through the first two tracks. Lots of predictable empty AOR bluster arriving from nowhere and going straight back there. It sounds exactly as I thought it would, and could have been made at any time in the last 30 years.</span></span><br />
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<span data-offset-key="eq8fr-0-0"><span data-text="true">How this dull fare has the gall to call itself a word derived from "progressive" should be the least of anyone's concerns. Frankly, this is no less referential or unimaginative than anything Ed Sheeran has come up with. In fact I'd rather go see the ginger minstrel, as at least his audience would be more pleasing on the eye.</span></span><br />
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<span data-offset-key="eq8fr-0-0"><span data-text="true">This uninspiring musical constipation clogging my earways reminds me why I need to take a break from the unrelenting tsunami of mind-numbing noise that is forever engulfing us all. Yes, the occasional diamond surfaces, and deserves the spotlight I might throw on it, but someone else can have go for a while. You may see more live reviews, interviews, and who knows, actual music journalism from my acerbic virtual pen in the future, but album reviews...as I said, I need a break.</span></span><br />
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<span data-offset-key="eq8fr-0-0"><span data-text="true">Bye-ee!</span></span></div>
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Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-43263068544243740322018-01-28T14:03:00.002+00:002018-01-28T15:58:01.029+00:00Mark E Smith - Totally WiredMark Edward Smith, who died aged 60 from a combination of bizarre and mundane illnesses that apparently baffled his doctors, a fact his ghost is no doubt cackling away at as I type, would of course take exception at yet another splurge of verbosity in his honour, such as this. Among the many things he professed to hate was "soft lads who blab." Oh well, he was the bloke who epitomised the old adage "never meet your heroes" after all, so being a mild irritant to his ghost is no skin off my hooter.<br />
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I first came across The Fall sometime in 1979 when subjected to their debut album <i>Live At The Witch Trials</i> round a mate's house. I remember thinking to myself "what a dumb racket this is", and me au fait with the punk ethos too. It's still not an album I can listen to, to be honest, although I appreciate its ramshackle DIY art terror. In those pre-interweb days it took years before my young naive self twigged what "<i>No Xmas For John Quays</i>" actually meant, by which time I was long a convert, my Damascene moment occurring seconds into my first hearing of the single <i>Rowche Rumble</i> on the John Peel Show, probably sometime in July 1979, not more than a month or two on from that first encounter.<br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Rowche Rumble</i> is four minutes of primitive glam-punk perfection with a subversive scat from Mark concerning ethical and moral corruption within government, the medical profession, and the pharmaceutical industry. And he named his band after a Camus novel, one that I bet was read by a fair number of us spotty oiks who may never otherwise have been aware of its existence. Like the band the book is hard work but ultimately rewarding.<br />
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How dare they fling this filth at our pop kids! Well they didn't because only us few wise young/old heads bought <i>Rowche Rumble</i>, but it started a run of four perfect anti-pop blasts from Manchester's finest that would see me well and truly submerged into the murky depths of Fall Sound, and the joy of Repetition, a tenet carved in vinyl as the third track of the same name on their debut single released on 11th August 1978.<br />
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John Peel famously said of his favourite band "always different, always the same". The glittering likes of <i>Rowche Rumble</i>, <i>Fiery Jack</i>, <i>How I Wrote Elastic Man</i>, and the fabulous speedfreak anthem <i>Totally Wired</i> were meat and drink to the Peel disciples, but The Fall were at their best when subverting the mainstream with covers of <i>Ghost In My House</i> and <i>Victoria</i>, which saw them make two minor dents on the real Top 40, and thereby the subconscious of the wider audience of pop pickers.<br />
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Mark's observations on life peppered with his cut'n'paste surrealism made for lyrics that were truly unique. These were delivered in his trademark drawl that as the years progressed became the often unintelligible but undoubtedly dyspeptic bark of the mad old bloke sat on his own in the corner of the pub, but we wouldn't have had it any other way. Thankfully the marvellous fan resource <a href="http://thefall.org/">thefall.org</a> takes the hard work out of deciphering Smith's more mangled blasts.<br />
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<i>"I wrote about what was around me, but some people are so daft they don't understand that writing about Prestwich is just as valid as Dante writing about his Inferno"</i><br />
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As a live act they were gloriously unpredictable, often veering from the sublime to the ridiculous within the same song, particularly in later years as Mark prowled the stage, fiddling with his musician's amps. Being a soundman for The Fall must have been a nightmare, which is probably why, as legend has it, they designed an on-stage monitor especially for Mark called the "DFA Amp" that the irascible frontman could muck about with to his heart's content. It didn't take him long to twig what "DFA" stood for!<br />
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The musical legacy Mark has left us with is a wonderfully primitive, visceral thing, topped off with his often incisive and frequently impenetrable stream of consciousness verbiage, and as such it has stood the test of time better than that of most of his punk contemporaries, partly because he never stopped until nature stopped him.<br />
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RIP Mark E Smith, now fiddling with Jimi's amp on the great stage in the far beyond...Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-5903495175752472382018-01-28T12:15:00.000+00:002018-01-28T12:15:29.002+00:00The Daily Farkin' News...and now, over to our not-popular music correspondent, Felicity Hairshirt. What have you for us today, Felicitititititity?<br />
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You really must sort that stammer out, Bob, here, have a banana daiquiri...<br /><br />First up tonight from the prog puddle is news that Big Big Train's much talked about "new direction" is indeed an Earth Wind & Fire styled disco album, as I predicted in my end-of-year blog, to be recorded under the pseudonym Big Mo-reece. Turns out it was the real reason Andy Poole left, as he can't dance, unlike David Longdon, who can now indulge his Maurice White obsession to the max. You should hear Greg Spawton's fretless slap bass, in 13/8!!!<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSfzQWgEoZQ93rm7TzhIhMppKlk1wZCLgkcs-kmDi7-9QrRlurJuFYPmWP2r8JVifTdQk4ijxw5WLHI9SkkcZSrZD_QUSPVUINHtZMUOUa4YN6Jqf792D2kx2-ZFafdj7UYkKb6XnuC_p_/s1600/maurice-white-1981-performance-billboard-650.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="421" data-original-width="636" height="211" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSfzQWgEoZQ93rm7TzhIhMppKlk1wZCLgkcs-kmDi7-9QrRlurJuFYPmWP2r8JVifTdQk4ijxw5WLHI9SkkcZSrZD_QUSPVUINHtZMUOUa4YN6Jqf792D2kx2-ZFafdj7UYkKb6XnuC_p_/s320/maurice-white-1981-performance-billboard-650.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">David Longdon</td></tr>
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...<br />
<br />
Moving swiftly on, changes of direction seem to be this year's thing, with shocking revelations that prog luvvies The Gift's new album is to be much rockier and more rifftastic than anything they've done before. The new sound is shrouded in secrecy, but I spotted singist Michael Mortone (dig the new "metal" name, Mikey! I know I wasn't supposed to tell anyone, but hey, wotcha gonna do?) leaving a rehearsal studio gasping and clutching at his throat after a marathon session learning how to "Cookie Monster", followed by a grinning Mikael Akerfeldt. Whodathunkit??!<br /><br />
When asked to comment, he couldn't, above an unintelligible hoarse whisper, but Akerfeldt chipped in with "The jackets have to go, and he'll be needing some tatts, but for now the spiky gauntlets will do".<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzwNefZejYe9QyULrg2wyn0uVqzRNZrfKdoofYgl0EuittyjARsArDfimY1y83-SgHDACod2Cgnf1jKh9zLk-bAxKNxVf5WhcinrlWSlpTXhmCq_7_H-k9PkpanXtwgxfR7aSkwWlGtH0_/s1600/15043589_538000186399886_5120704535664263168_n.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="488" data-original-width="488" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzwNefZejYe9QyULrg2wyn0uVqzRNZrfKdoofYgl0EuittyjARsArDfimY1y83-SgHDACod2Cgnf1jKh9zLk-bAxKNxVf5WhcinrlWSlpTXhmCq_7_H-k9PkpanXtwgxfR7aSkwWlGtH0_/s320/15043589_538000186399886_5120704535664263168_n.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Michael Mortone</td></tr>
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...<br />
<br />
As we all know, everyone in Scandinavia is or has been in a band at some point in their enviously contented lives. Some of them were or indeed, are in a bunch of prog noodlers called The Flower Kings. The band have stunned their fans with news that their latest album will contain 15 three-minute songs, each with a beginning, middle, and...wait for it...an end! Guitar wizard Roine Stolt describes this as their "We Can't Dance period".<br />
...<br />
<br />
Speaking of bands who wish it were 1973ish and sound like Fragile By The Pound...on second thoughts, I can't be arsed.<br />
...<br />
<br />
Back to Blighty with the not entirely unexpected news that Bad Elephant "musician" Tom Slatter was arrested yesterday on suspicion of the murder of label PR bloke, the exiled Yorkie James Turner, after the latter's body was found up a tree in Bristol with the Oxford Book Of Puns protruding from an orifice it is not polite to mention before the watershed. As he was led away in manacles, Slatter mumbled something approximating "I'm normally a pacifisht, but Turner's constant punning pushed me off the scale, I was so tench, and AAAARRRRGGGGHHHH...."<br />
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When asked to comment, Bad Elephant supremo,The Enforcer, aka Dave "Knuckles" Elliott, aka (that's enuff akas - Ed) would only say "I expect the new album by Wednesday, or I'll kidnap his collection of ocelots and curry 'em up for dinner, one by one."<br />
...<br />
<br />
And finally, one I'm sure you've heard, as this man has something called "a profile", a thing hitherto unheard of in these murky waters...Steven Wilson, a lifelong Catholic, was canonised yesterday by Pope Francis, becoming only the second rock musician to walk the Earth as a living saint, after Val Doonican.<br />
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Rumours that Frankie wants him to do a 10-CD/Blu-ray concept album based on the New Testament, in 7.1 felatio sound and vision, are unfounded.<br />
...<br />
<br />
And now, it's time for the weather, with Snarky McPhistle & Doug The Dog...<br />
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Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-78223717095918561012018-01-13T12:34:00.003+00:002018-01-13T12:40:01.985+00:00The Fierce And The Dead - Truck<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2X1_SbOchXImKA95nlhSPaLzig2l7WN9LwuwIJsNlZarIb1ibQPiqHnU9ZU3UUiMuihFJa6m7yMRwdM_N4BbJZlY93SspooWmyvhpOFb25ZURUrZOiyTiMRLGZWKb4U9HX0YJYpvUk50h/s1600/unnamed.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="517" data-original-width="1024" height="201" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2X1_SbOchXImKA95nlhSPaLzig2l7WN9LwuwIJsNlZarIb1ibQPiqHnU9ZU3UUiMuihFJa6m7yMRwdM_N4BbJZlY93SspooWmyvhpOFb25ZURUrZOiyTiMRLGZWKb4U9HX0YJYpvUk50h/s400/unnamed.png" width="400" /></a></div>
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2018 is an important year for Rushden exiles The Fierce And The Dead, as they have sunk everything into the hopeful and fully deserved success of their much anticipated new album, which will be with us as Spring puts its knickers on, makes a cup of tea, and returns as Summer.<br />
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The album launch gig in May in That London has sold out, the band are no doubt relieved to know, and here we have a little teaser of what is to come with their new single <i>Truck</i>.<br />
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You will be delighted to know I am not going to dissect it, as you can find out for yourself by watching the accompanying video below, that IT ROCKS!!! Be sure to turn it up to ornament-troubling levels.<br />
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Spot that riff that comes in, around 2:50?...heheh<br />
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Anyone wanting more of this huge sweaty band of renegades will find them tearing it up out there in Hackney on Saturday 3rd February, as part of an all-dayer under the heading <i>8 Days of Chaos</i>. Info on this and other shenanigans in the links below.<br />
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<b>Links:</b><br />
<a href="http://fierceandthedead.com/">The Fierce And The Dead</a><br />
The Fierce And The Dead - <a href="https://www.facebook.com/fierceandthedead/">Facebook</a><br />
The Fierce Army - <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/fierceandthedead/">Facebook</a><br />
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Get the single <a href="http://music.badelephant.co.uk/?filter_band=261973657">HERE</a> from 26th January - pay what you like...or not!<br />
<a href="http://mailchi.mp/96a57d20b17f/8yoc-2603625">8 Days of Chaos</a>Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-25826583727819451892017-12-30T15:26:00.000+00:002017-12-30T16:00:25.943+00:00The Winter Solstice BoxWhat did you get for Xmas in the way of music, then? These are my choice gifted shiny discs of the usurped pagan festival, narrated with my usual acerbic flare...<br />
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<b>The Who - Maximum As&Bs</b><br />
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There really was something in the water in 1967, and Owsley Stanley probably put it there. Whatever it was, it made so many bands explode with creativity in a manner that was never anticipated, least of all by the bands themselves. One of those groups was The 'Oo, who up to that point had a knack for a catchy single, and in Pete Townshend they had a writer brimming with ideas, which combined with the potent chemistry of their line up made for an exciting proposition on <i>Ready Steady Go</i>. Like all bands from the early 60s, even The Beatles, the b-sides from their early years were more often than not filler rather than killer. Then in 1967 out of the blue came <i>I Can See For Miles</i> which witnessed Townshend's songwriting take a huge leap forward. Suddenly they were so much more than just a noisy pop band.<br />
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This nicely put together box set can be split into two, the first three and a bit CDs of five being mostly highly entertaining, the rest of the "play once and file" variety. Everything that comes before <i>I Can See For Miles</i> is a band scratching around looking for a road to travel, with occasional gems on the a-side hiding filler and experiments at the mixing desk going rather awry on the b-sides. What the heck was going through Pete's mind while making the godawful mess that is <i>Disguises</i>?<br />
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<i>I Can See For Miles</i> arrives near the end of CD Two, and CD Three is where the main action is, starting with <i>Pinball Wizard</i>, which poffers the incongruous prospect of the pugilistic Roger Daltrey - what is it with musos called Roger and punching walls? - playing the delicate innocent abroad deaf dumb and blind kid, and ends with the perfunctory but nevertheless rocktastic <i>Relay</i>. It also contains my fave 'Oo single, <i>The Seeker</i>, along with four minutes of evidence in the form of <i>Dogs Part Two</i> that Townshend might be a great rhythm player and songwriter, but a lead plank spanker he ain't. Good to know that you don't need the endless racket of <i>Live In Leeds</i>, the world's most overrated live album, to tell you that!<br />
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The 'Oo's finest moment, here in truncated single form is on the third CD too, and I defy you not to turn it up a notch or two when the opening riff of <i>Won't Get Fooled Again</i> crashes in. Another fave of mine is the rather underrated downhome rabblerouser with Jew's Harp that is <i>Join Together</i>, the by then somewhat dated hippy sentiment being at odds with the band's admirable aggressive stance notwithstanding. Predating Townshend's work with Ronnie Lane it has a "getting it together in the country" feel, with DM's on. Given their stance and their connection with their audience, The 'Oo were probably the first punk band when all's said and done. <i>Join Together</i>'s b-side, a rather yawnsome Daltrey chest beating and Townshend guitar workout symptomatic of their live sound at the time, is the only filler on the third CD.<br />
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By the fourth CD, the law of diminishing returns has kicked in, and really, it's all over by track seven (of 16), the somewhat wheezing <i>Who Are You</i>, which rather pointedly, coming out as it did in the year of punk showed how the spiritual fathers of the UK safety pin generation had run out of steam. Also of course, soon after that single the band lost a cornerstone with the sad death of Moon The Loon. Maybe they should have had the dignity and sense to call it a day then, in a similar fashion to Led Zeppelin a couple of years later.<br />
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The rest of the fourth and the fifth CD are really fans only affairs containing as they do numerous live tracks and some non-essential studio work by later line ups that have little of the original band's energy or direction.<br />
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<i>Maximum As&Bs </i>is not bad at all, but I wouldn't have bought it. This is what Xmas is for, after all!<br />
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<b>The Beatles - Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band - 2 CD Edition</b><br />
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We are constantly told The Beatles had a lot do with or even caused the seismic shift in popular music that took place in 1967, so it must be true. Personally, I think that the likes of Hendrix, and to a lesser extent Cream had just as much to do with it, although to be fair it could be argued that the Scousers kick-started the process with the previous year's <i>Revolver</i>.<i> </i>As far as <i>Sgt. Pepper</i> goes, obviously there is nothing left to be said about what is probably the most well-known collection of tracks ever committed to tape, so I don't really need to add anything, other than the fact that Giles Martin's stereo remix is truly marvellous, and knocks his dad's team's original afterthought of a stereo mix into a cocked dustbin.<br />
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The second CD contains wonderful remixes of the contemporaneous <i>Penny/Lane/Strawberry Fields Forever</i> single, annoyingly hidden away as tracks 16 and 18, so you have to fiddle around with the remote to play them in sequence. I wonder how many folk are going to burn a CD or store a playlist with the single either before or after the main album, and never play the rest of CD 2 again, which is merely a collection of inessential play once outtakes?<br />
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<b>Soft Machine - Live In Paris</b><br />
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This one is courtesy of my trusty gig-going companion Phil W, who knows my odd taste pretty well. Therefore, I sensibly waited until my better half was out of the house before entertaining the cats with its fulsome racket, recorded in 1972 at the venerable Paris L'Olympia.<br />
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Actually, Mike Ratledge's more edgy and teeth-rattling fuzz-driven Lowery organ work is largely absent, or buried in the mix, often replaced instead by his, or subservient to Elton Dean's electric pianos, so I need not have worried. This makes the sound far more palatable, even on the the band's most outre work <i>Facelift</i>.<br />
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The album features everything but <i>Moon In June</i> from <i>Third</i>, all but one track of <i>Fifth</i>, and some great improv pieces. Dean's reeds are fabulous of course, and Marshall and Hopper are a rhythm section to die for, and all in all this is a fabulous live album.Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-4701181110892189452017-12-16T15:53:00.000+00:002017-12-17T22:51:09.323+00:002017 - A Year In Review<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjChQIC8tiFNMZ9BLh4SqktxsfxYE6v47GPCchYBxZCdzR_UmIZVCWkYY0dTaY2TLB4Vi-XK1VAIJzDI-HdlsLq5HXD60aXp4L8UFvGntIc_mX8kAdcN443ffp7HH9ePNHn-3TK1pGaTKah/s1600/angrycat_78793.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="367" data-original-width="320" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjChQIC8tiFNMZ9BLh4SqktxsfxYE6v47GPCchYBxZCdzR_UmIZVCWkYY0dTaY2TLB4Vi-XK1VAIJzDI-HdlsLq5HXD60aXp4L8UFvGntIc_mX8kAdcN443ffp7HH9ePNHn-3TK1pGaTKah/s320/angrycat_78793.jpg" width="279" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Gimme live meat, now</td></tr>
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Well, that's another year over, and the Matrix, which went "RAAAWWWWGGGGGHHHH!!!" before projectile-vomiting several handfuls of nuts and bolts across the cosmos in the middle of 2016, is still waiting for the repair man to call it seems. However, life goes on and the never ending broiling sea of music keeps on rising, threatening my meagre flood defences. It's time to make A LIST, which I have been told is a pointless exercise, and it most probably is, but it satisfies the urge to scratch at an OCD itch or two.<br />
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There follows said LIST, in rough chronological order of release. Not so much a "Best Of", as there are doubtless glaring emissions, even within the small dusty musical corner I inhabit, but more a round up of the better albums that have come my way during 17th year of the 21st century. Those I like the most are highlighted by one, two or even three glittering asterisks, and I may even tell you what my Album Of The Year is at the end, not that you should care, of course!<br />
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For those that do the streaming thang, there is a Spotify playlist below, which covers most if not all of the gnarled beauties mentioned herein. Links to reviews in the titles, as ever. Spark up a big one, pull up the comfy chair, beckon the cat to your lap, and settle in...<br />
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<i>*Knekklectric - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/12/15/knekklectric-for-mange-melodia/">For Mange Melodia</a></i><br />
This came out back in January on Norway's always interesting Apollon Records label, but I've only just noticed it, and I'm glad I did. These tongue-twistingly named denizens of Ålesund play dense art-rock-pop of a very high quality indeedy. Check it out!<br />
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<i>Tohpati Ethnomission - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/04/24/tohpati-ethnomission-mata-hati/">Mata Hati</a></i><br />
Wonderfully diverse sounds. A truly global album that serves to highlight the futility of national boundaries, lines on maps that only exist if you want them to.<br />
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*<i>Wingfield Reuter Stavi Sirkis - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/03/06/wingfield-reuter-stavi-sirkis-the-stone-house/">The Stone House</a></i><br />
The first of two instalments this year from the fusion ensemble's corruscating marathon improv session recorded in 2016. Never a dull moment.<br />
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<i>Eat Lights Become Lights - Nature Reserve</i><br />
Shake the chalk dust out of yer bouffant and put yer Krautslippers on, baby-o...<br />
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**<i>iNFiNiEN – <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/05/06/infinien-light-at-the-endless-tunnel/">Light at the Endless Tunnel</a></i><br />
OK, it came out on Bandcamp in November 2016, but the CD release date was 1st February 2017, so that will do for me. What can I say? A band to rival Bent Knee in adventurousness and scope. Bloody marvellous!<br />
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<i>Aquaserge - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/05/31/aquaserge-laisse-ca-etre/">Laisse ça être</a></i><br />
Mon aéroglisseur est plein d'anguilles. Slippery fun! :)<br />
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<i>Juxtavoices - <a href="http://astoundedbysound.blogspot.co.uk/2017/05/juxtavoices-warning-may-contain-notes.html">Warning: May Contain Notes</a></i><br />
Choirs were never like this in my day.<br />
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<i>Mouse on the Keys - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/04/25/mouse-on-the-keys-out-of-body-ep/">Out of Body (EP)</a></i><br />
Jerky modernistic electronica and trickery that will make your knees twitch, on a right little tease of an 18-minute EP that will leave you entirely unsatiated.<br />
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<i>Tim Bowness - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/02/17/tim-bowness-lost-in-the-ghost-light/">Lost In The Ghost Light</a></i><br />
In which Tim fully assumes the mantle of Prog's Torch Singer. It is all getting a bit too slick for me, but Tim more than deserves any long overdue success that comes his way.<br />
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<i>*Stefano Giannotti & Salvo Lazzara – <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/09/28/stefano-giannotti-salvo-lazzara-la-vostra-ansia-di-orizzonte/">La vostra ansia di orizzonte</a></i><br />
This beautiful piece of art is certainly progressive, but not in the slightest prog, and has a timeless quality that will ensure its shelf life is considerably longer than the usual suspects that will occupy the top end of Best Prog Album lists this year. Making clever use of sampled found sounds, free jazz instincts, classical arrangements and an ear for the melodically unusual, without ever being strident, I find this album fascinating. It will probably sell about a 10000th the amount of those previously mentioned albums, more's the pity.<br />
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Along with Juxtavoices, the most experimental offering here.<br />
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<i>Orange Clocks - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/02/28/orange-clocks-topes-sphere-2/">Tope's Sphere 2</a></i><br />
They bombed Higham Ferrers' chippy during the war, and this is East Northants' revenge on the dastardly Hun. Possibly.<br />
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<i>The Hadron Big Bangers - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/04/23/the-hadron-big-bangers-flash/">flAsh</a></i><br />
It barks and howls, and lets off firecrackers in your bathroom.<br />
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J<i>umble Hole Clough - <a href="http://astoundedbysound.blogspot.co.uk/2017/07/jumble-hole-clough-go-and-play-quietly.html">Go and play quietly by yourself</a></i><br />
The ever-prolific Colin Robinson gets all whimsical in his lonesome funky shed, oop narth, 'appen.<br />
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<i>The Bug vs Earth - Concrete Desert</i><br />
An odd pairing - ultra-modern sound manipulator The Bug, known for experiments in dub, grime & dancehall, whatever those last two are, and drone-metal (nope, me neither) guitar slinger Dylan Carlson team up for a dystopian cinematic instrumental album inspired by J G Ballard depicting the end of days in an alien and alienating Los Angeles. Nice it isn't, and you can almost taste the petrol fumes. Depicts what it says on the tin.<br />
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*<i>Karda Estra -<a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/02/20/karda-estra-infernal-spheres/">Infernal Spheres</a></i><br />
Richard Wileman's vehicle for his singular classically inspired progressive music making just keeps on giving.<br />
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<i>Big Hogg - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/04/08/big-hogg-gargoyles/">Gargoyles</a></i><br />
Some big Scottish fun in among the furrowed brows to jolly up this LIST. Frankie Miller and Alex Harvey would approve.<br />
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*<i>Pat Mastelotto & Markus Reuter - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/05/15/pat-mastelotto-markus-reuter-face/">FACE</a></i><br />
This is nothing like prog, but <i>FACE</i> is as close to prog as these two are ever likely to get.<br />
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<i>Markus Reuter featuring SONAR and Tobias Reber</i> <i>- <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/05/15/markus-reuter-feat-sonar-tobias-reber-falling-for-ascension/">Falling For Ascension</a></i><br />
Markus with Sonar as his backing band do the incremental bop with all the icily intellectual style you would expect.<br />
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<i>Miriodor - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/07/24/miriodor-signal-9/">Signal 9</a></i><br />
A classy and intricate listen, as you would expect from the long-running French-Canadian troupe.<br />
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*<i>AKKU Quintet - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/04/30/akku-quintet-aeon/">Aeon</a></i><br />
The modern tradition of Swiss minimalist jazz fusion continues with this band, who take as long as it takes to get from A to B, as it should be.<br />
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**<i>Cheer-Accident - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/07/18/cheer-accident-putting-off-death/">Putting Off Death</a></i><br />
Another long-running band who are not the slightest bit perturbed that fame will never come a-knocking, and continue to make their own inimitable sounds. "Adventurous and accessible" say I.<br />
<br />
***<i>All Them Witches - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/03/15/all-them-witches-sleeping-through-the-war/">Sleeping Through The War</a></i><br />
Marvellously unhinged swamp rock, from Nashville of all places. My mate Shawn sez this is "a gloriously groovy mindfuck". Yup, that's about right.<br />
<br />
<i>Thinking Plague - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/03/21/thinking-plague-hoping-against-hope/">Hoping Against Hope</a></i><br />
Wilfully individual furrows ploughed by Mike Johnson's far-flung veteran avant rockers for the pleasure of us miscreants and misfits the world over. There's a 14-minute avant-epic entitled <i>A Dirge For The Unwitting</i> on here...you have been warned.<br />
<br />
<i>Richard Barbieri - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/04/06/richard-barbieri-planets-persona/">Planets + Persona</a></i><br />
Video of the Year, filmed in 360° - see below. The album is none too shabby, either!<br />
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*<i>O.R.k. - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/03/25/o-r-k-soul-of-an-octopus/">Soul Of An Octopus</a></i><br />
The multi-national underground supergroup return with a second album of heavy alt-pop-prog.<br />
<br />
<i>Machine Mass - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/06/19/machine-mass-plays-hendrix/">Machine Mass Plays Hendrix</a></i><br />
A brave move from Belgian guitarist Michel Delville's adventurous band, which pays off handsomely by tearing up the rule book.<br />
<br />
<i>Richard Dawson - Peasant</i><br />
Folk music's Scott Walker equivalent channels ISB and Robert Wyatt in a sprawling tale of grubby survival in the Dark Ages.<br />
<br />
<i>The Bob Lazar Story - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/04/10/the-bob-lazar-story-baritonia/">Baritonia</a></i><br />
Matt Deacon has a febrile musical imagination, and each album he makes is better than the last. His music is the one aspect of his life where his delusional rantings are put to good use. ;)<br />
<br />
<i>Toby Driver - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/07/11/toby-driver-madonnawhore/">Madonnawhore</a></i><br />
Ghost whispers of Catholic guilt crowd the fragile air. As they do...<br />
<br />
<i>Valdez - <a href="http://www.progradar.org/index.php/2017/05/24/review-valdez-this-by-leo-trimming/">"This"</a></i><br />
Classy Rundgrenesque art-pop from Simon Godfrey and members of Echolyn. Very good indeed.<br />
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**<i>Nick Prol & The Proletarians - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/04/17/nick-prol-the-proletarians-loon-attic/">Loon Attic</a></i><br />
The kitchen sink gets smashed to pieces by a troupe of restless gibbons and is then reassembled by a previously unknown tribe deep in the Amazon jungle, who while they know nothing of modern plumbing aids, have an ear for a catchy tune.<br />
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***<i>Ulver - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/04/12/ulver-the-assassination-of-julius-caesar/">The Assassination of Julius Caesar</a></i><br />
Norwegian progressive iconoclasts make "pop" album shock horror!!! Well yes, but it's much, much more than that, and unlike the other ironically far more popular nominally pop convert further down this list, <i>The Assassination of Julius Caesar</i> doesn't sound remotely like anything they've done before. This is what progression sounds like.<br />
<br />
<i>ZU - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/04/18/zu-jhator/">Jhator</a></i><br />
Meditative ur-rock for the furrowed brow.<br />
<br />
**<i>Mew - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/05/10/mew-visuals/">Visuals</a></i><br />
There was a time when I couldn't put this band down, but she had a fling with a producer, and we drifted apart a long time ago. In fact the last album I bought by them was the fabrous <i>And The Glass Handed Kites</i>, way back in 2005. Visuals is only the third album since then, but a relative flurry of activity in the unhurried world of Mew has now resulted in two albums in as many years. Steady on, chaps! Their muse is obviously mining a rich seam, and the care and craft lavished on this great record pays good dividends. Scandi-pop hasn't sounded this good since A-ha.<br />
<br />
**<i>faUSt - <a href="http://astoundedbysound.blogspot.co.uk/2017/05/faust-fresh-air.html">Fresh Air</a></i><br />
Very long-running Brit panel comedy show <i>Have I Got News For You</i> recently featured Jean-Hervé Peron as one of four suspects in its "Odd One Out" picture round, which was a surprise, as was the vibrancy of this album released back in the summer. Jean-Hervé was playing symphonies on a cement mixer in the quiz show picture, as well he might.<br />
<br />
**<i>Arve Henriksen - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/08/09/arve-henriksen-towards-language/">Towards Language</a></i><br />
More elegiac trumpet playing from the Norwegian master. Sublime.<br />
<br />
<i>Schnauser - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/06/04/schnauser-irritant/">Irritant</a></i><br />
Scratch it...no, down a bit...left a bit...that's it! This album satisfies a need for quirky invention combined with hummable choons. What's not to like? Maybe the cover, which much like their previous long player, is deliberately hideous.<br />
<br />
<i>Mumpbeak - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/07/02/mumpbeak-tooth/">Tooth</a></i><br />
He loves his clavinet, does Roy Powell, he rather likes his Hammond too.<br />
<br />
<i>The Universe By Ear - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/06/10/the-universe-by-ear-the-universe-by-ear/">The Universe By Ear</a></i><br />
Noisy Krimsoid blooze in spirit, where thankfully the 12-bar is never once troubled for a light on this fine debut.<br />
<br />
<i>**Orchestra of the Upper Atmosphere - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/07/26/orchestra-of-the-upper-atmosphere-%CE%B83/">O3</a></i><br />
This album is MASSIVE, a sprawling trip into Krautrock influenced rock improv the likes of which you won't hear bettered at this moment in time and space. Now available through Bandcamp.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<iframe seamless="" src="https://bandcamp.com/EmbeddedPlayer/album=1490020100/size=small/bgcol=ffffff/linkcol=0687f5/track=2765705857/transparent=true/" style="border: 0; height: 42px; width: 100%;"><a href="http://discusmusic.bandcamp.com/album/theta-three-63cd">Theta Three - 63CD by Orchestra Of The Upper Atmosphere</a></iframe></div>
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**<i>The Mark Lanegan Band - Gargoyle</i><br />
Mark's croonsome baritone sashays through some killer tunes with a swagger in its step and just a hint of menace. Which is nice.<br />
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<i>Big Bad Wolf - <a href="http://www.dprp.net/reviews/2017-074.php#bigbadwolf">Pond Life </a></i><br />
Charming and occasionally tantalisingly complex, this is chill out music for lesser boffins, thus avoiding headaches caused by wilful degrees of difficulty.<br />
<br />
<i>Dusan Jevtovic - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/11/04/dusan-jevtovic-no-answer/">No Answer</a></i><br />
Thoroughly modern jazz fusion that will cauterise your ear hairs.<br />
<br />
**<i>Bent Knee - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/06/24/bent-knee-land-animal/">Land Animal</a></i><br />
The unjustified stick this band get from the more conservative corners of the Progwelt is symptomatic of how the majority of prog fans just can't handle innovation and difference, a delicious irony indeed. Or maybe their dismissive attiude arises because Bent Knee may appeal to music fans away from our particularly obsessive corner, or even possibly that like some of their compatriots in the "Scene That Isn't" - I'm thinking Moe Tar, Half Past Four, iNFiNiEN, to name but three - they have a forthright female as a front-person? Hmmm...<br />
<br />
Anyway, <i>Land Animal</i> is maybe over-ambitious and tries just a tad too hard, and for me doesn't quite reach the dizzy heights of previous album Say So. For all that it conforms to the cliché "More ideas in one song than most bands have in entire albums", especially so those in the prog pond, and MOJO magazine are probably right when they said in their review of the album that "If prog rock has a future then Bent Knee are surely it".<br />
<br />
***<i>Elder - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/06/26/elder-reflections-of-a-floating-world/">Reflections of a Floating World</a></i><br />
ROCK! Fuck, yeah!<br />
<br />
**<i>Laura Marling - Semper Femina</i><br />
The supremely talented Ms Marling iterates once more on the feminine condition in that alt-folk crossed with Lou Reed way of hers. Still only 27 and now on her sixth album, had she been a baby boomer she'd be as internationally revered as Joni Mitchell. A perfect record for a hot summer afternoon.<br />
<br />
<i>The Tangent - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/06/30/the-tangent-the-slow-rust-of-forgotten-machinery/">The Slow Rust Of Forgotten Machinery</a></i><br />
I've listened to the new Tangent offering...all of it, which must say something. I quite like it in parts, it has a very sub-Zappa/fusion groove, and is much less deliberately proggy ("proggy"...did I just say that? Damn and blast!) than some of their output. Not only that, but Andy's idiosyncratic singing is almost passable! His righteous political ranting hits the spot too. There are not many on the all too cosy prog sofa who tell it like it is, regardless of how many fans they might alienate. Which hopefully won't be too many for in order to truly appreciate art as well as to make it you need an open mind, one that is accepting of diversity and of course, you must have a love of creative freedom. All of which excludes the closed mind of the conservative thinker, he says, naively...or provocatively. ;)<br />
<br />
<i>Anni Elif - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/10/03/a-different-aspect-9-october-2017/">Edith</a></i><br />
Norwegian singer-songwriter plays jazz-inflected dark electronica. Which hardly begins to sum up this captivating album.<br />
<br />
<i>Papir - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/11/19/papir-v/">V</a></i><br />
Danish metronomic space rockers hit precisely calculated musical peaks with guitars. QED.<br />
<br />
<i>Peter Perrett - How The West Was Won</i><br />
The unlikely return of rock's lost poet is everything I dared to hope it would be. We should all be grateful he's still capable of walking the walk and talking the talk.<br />
<br />
<i>Discipline - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/07/07/discipline-captives-of-the-wine-dark-sea/">Captives Of The Wine Dark Sea</a></i><br />
An engaging and involving art-rock excursion from long-running American band. And no, it doesn't sound the slightest bit like Van der Graaf Generator...ok, maybe a teeny bit.<br />
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***<i>UNKLE - The Road: Part 1</i><br />
The electronica giants' first album for seven years is essentially a James Lavelle solo album "featuring", as is the wont of modern pop, a whole load of disparate folk from all walks of modern alt-pop music. This makes the record a stylistic mash up of electronica and all kinds of modern rock(ish) and pop. It is a mess, but oddly it works, as it is all loosely thematically linked by spoken word "Iters", the first of which sets the the tone with actor Brian Cox's "Have you thought about the mistakes you made?", no doubt a self-referential nod by the author to his extended burial under a vast snowfield of coke following his initial brush with success. Quite a compelling work, all told.<br />
<br />
<i>Steven Wilson - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/07/31/steven-wilson-to-the-bone/">To The Bone</a></i><br />
"There's only one thing worse than being talked about, and that's not being talked about", which I believe was one of Wilde's. Mr Wilson was never in any danger of not being talked about, even if he hadn't made a nominally "pop" album. Everything changes, but essentially stays the same...apart from THAT song, which is actually rather good. Enough, already.<br />
<br />
**<i>Hammock - Mysterium</i><br />
The very sad backstory of this album lends weight to Hammock's already signature sound depicting "despair at the gates of ennui" translated into music. Inappropriate jesting aside, this is as near to a perfect expression of grief and its aftermath through music as you are likely to hear this or any other year. I wouldn't recommend playing this straight after Nick Cave's Skeleton Tree.<br />
<br />
Like All Them Witches, Hammock are based in Nashville, which obviously has far more going for it that us outsiders might assume.<br />
<br />
**<i>My Tricksy Spirit - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/08/31/my-tricksy-spirit-my-tricksy-spirit/">My Tricksy Spirit</a></i><br />
Dub gamelan summer trippin' the heavy fantastic!<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>(Note - Weird timing tags make this impossible to post individual tracks to the Spotify playlist, but there's a link to Bandcamp streaming in the linked review)</i></span><br />
<br />
*<i>Wingfield Reuter Sirkis - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/10/31/wingfield-reuter-sirkis-lighthouse/">Lighthouse</a></i><br />
Second instalment of sizzling improv from masters of the craft. See second entry in this list for the first.<br />
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***<i>Motorpsycho - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/12/08/motorpsycho-the-tower/">The Tower</a></i><br />
The Norwegian space travellers turn up in Laurel Canyon, put CS&N on a rocket ship and fire it at the sun, among other groovy things. A simply massive album!<br />
<br />
**<i>Inner Ear Brigade - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/11/07/inner-ear-brigade-dromology/">Dromology</a></i><br />
Primal and odd, and a must-listen!<br />
<br />
<i>Trojan Horse - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/10/17/trojan-horse-fukushima-surfer-boys/">Fukushima Surfer Boys</a></i><br />
There's a worrying amount of releases in this list from that nefarious Lahndahn label Bad Elephant Music, but contrary to your admittedly justified suspicions I haven't been threatened, nobody called Elliott 'as 'ad a word, 'onest guv. Actually, none of them are Cockneys as far as I can make out, which ruins my modern day Fagin analogy. Bastards.<br />
<br />
<i>French TV - Operation Mockingbird</i><br />
One of a handful of yer actual prog albums on this here list...yes, it may be referential, often way too complicated for its own good, and occasionally hard work, but if like me you like to take a trip down that peculiar road now and again there aren't any better guides than Mike Sary's wilful troupe. They don't make hunting down sample tracks too easy, so you'll have to trust me on this one!<br />
<br />
**<i>Charlie Cawood - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/10/25/charlie-cawood-the-divine-abstract/">The Divine Abstract</a></i><br />
The young musical polymath astounds with the scope of his vision. That sounds pretentious, I know, but such hyperbole in this case is merited. It's been a good year for Bad Elephant Music and this album may well be the best of the year for the label.<br />
<br />
*<i>The Knells - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/11/06/the-knells-knells-ii/">Knells II</a></i><br />
A really inventive album, and probably the best example of "voices as instruments" you'll hear this year. Combining a classical choral section with progressive rock instrumentation isn't a formula you'd expect to work, but it does. Unfortunately my old curse of perfect pitch means I find the harmonies occasionally rattle my finely tuned aural sensibilities, but I guess most wouldn't notice!<br />
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<i>Michael Head & The Red Elastic Band - Adios Señor Pussycat</i><br />
Ever since arriving on the scene a somewhat staggering 37 years ago, Michael Head has found writing winsomely effortless tunes tinged by a life of increasingly hard knocks as easy as scoring in a dark alley somewhere in Liverpool. His is the story of the blues, as another Scouser would have it.<br />
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<i>Courtney Swain - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/11/24/courtney-swain-growing-pains-ep/">Growing Pains EP</a></i><br />
The hugely talented Ms Swain makes her second foray into this list with a solo EP of alt-torch singer fare, reminiscing and emoting in her trademark swooping style with just her own piano playing for accompaniment, occasionally joined by a string trio. We are not worthy.<br />
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<i>LEF - Hypersomniac</i><br />
Dystopian concept album partly inspired by <i>The Wall</i>, with accompanying animated comic book.<br />
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<i>Peter Hammill - From The Trees</i><br />
A stripped-back musical frame supports more of the author's reflections on the passing of time and the realisation of mortality. Seemingly effortless class from simply the best lyric writer of the original generation of underground musicians who begat progressive rock.<br />
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<i>GRICE - The Grey of Granite Stone (EP)</i><br />
Delightfully crafted post-rock-pop with a classy supporting cast including Richard Barbieri and Steve Jansen. Hopefully, this serves as a teaser for an album.<br />
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Well, that was 2017...apart from...<br />
<br />
<span style="color: #660000;">Some re-releases/archival releases:</span><br />
<br />
<i>Radiohead - OK Computer - OKNOTOK 1997 2017</i><br />
Has it really been twenty years?<br />
<br />
The band's appearance at Glastonbury back in June made many of us go on a 'Head binge in the days following. I have said many times that pop is often more progressive than prog, and Oxford's miserablists in chief are prime evidence. <i>OK Computer </i>when it came out was light years ahead of the dreary Britpop it succeeded, and it was the album that launched the band into unlikely global mega stardom, something that did not sit easy on their undernourished narrow shoulders. Try as they might with the two albums that followed they couldn't shake off their by then huge fanbase, and they remain about the only band I can think of that can foist formless noisy experimental deconstructions on the masses and get away with it. They're not bad at choons too, which helps.<br />
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<i>Gentle Giant - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/09/06/gentle-giant-three-piece-suite-the-steven-wilson-remixes/">Three Piece Suite</a></i><br />
Frankly, if you don't like Gentle Giant, you don't really like progressive rock music, do you? Here, the Man In The Expensive Retro NHS Specs remakes and remodels the album's worth of master tapes that still exist from this class act's first three LPs, and the results are simply stunning, both in 5.1 surround sound and in the new stereo mixes.<br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Frank Zappa - <a href="https://astoundedbysound.blogspot.co.uk/2017/11/frank-zappa-halloween-77.html">Halloween 77</a></i><br />
Uncle Frank gets up close and personal over three discs of delightfully perverse live music.<br />
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<br />
<span style="color: #274e13;">Gig of the Year:</span><br />
<br />
I have never understood the fan mentality, where proclaiming that you've seen Tommy Winkle's Tumescent Trouser Sausage live 124 times is a final call in a pissing contest. I may have seen a few favourites live a handful of times, but I would far rather see a band I've never seen than one I have already seen. The proof of that is that seven out of the mere ten gigs I went to in 2017 were first timers. Having said that my gig of the year is not one of those, but shockingly a third timer - does that make me a fan? Heaven forfend! However, it was the first time I have ever seen a band in another country, and <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/02/11/magma-avec-le-metalik-orkestraah/">Magma with the Mekanik Orkestra at the splendidly appointed Paris Olympia</a> on a surprisingly mild 2nd February night was a marvellous experience. I thought at the time that the concert was unlikely to be bettered in the year then yet to come, and I was right.<br />
<br />
A few gigs came close - All Them Witches, Motorpsycho, and Ulver were all first timers and all enthralling in their own way, and North Sea Radio Orchestra were sublime, as ever. I regret missing Elder, and hope there might be another opportunity in the future. While low on quantity, 2017 was certainly high in quality, gigs-wise.<br />
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<br />
<span style="color: #073763;">2016 Albums That Got Away:</span><br />
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<i>Shaman Elephant - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2016/12/20/shaman-elephant-crystals/">Crystals</a></i><br />
Heavy riffage takes a bucketload of all the right drugs and goes "wibble". Smashing!<br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Richard Pinhas & Barry Cleveland - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/01/13/richard-pinhas-barry-cleveland-mu/">Mu</a></i><br />
Kosmiche rumble...<br />
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<i>Jumble Hole Clough - <a href="http://theprogressiveaspect.net/blog/2017/01/10/jumble-hole-clough-this-salty-armada-music-for-imaginary-puppet-shows-volume-one/">This Salty Armada</a></i><br />
Mr Colin Robinson, back in the shed again.<br />
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<i>Mercury Rev - The Light In You</i><br />
This came out in 2015, and I only found out about it in January this year! Criminal, considering it's probably their best since the career pinnacle that was Deserters' Songs all those years ago.<br />
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<br />
<span style="color: #7f6000;">Kontroversy Korner:</span><br />
<br />
Same old thing you've heard from me too many times already I shouldn't wonder...<br />
<br />
We all know how prog fans hate change, ironically enough, and it will be interesting to see how they take to Big Big Train's much anticipated change of direction and their soon come Earth Wind & Fire-styled disco album, which rumour has it is all down to singer David Longdon's long closeted Maurice White obession. Mirrorballtastic!<br />
<br />
<br />
<span style="color: #674ea7;">Irony Bypass of the Year:</span><br />
<br />
Pugilistic ex-Pink Floyd bass player and righteous Trump baiter Roger Waters advertised his UK tour back in October, with tickets starting at an eye-watering £100. The tour was billed as "Us + Them". Sigh...<br />
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<br />
<span style="color: #f4cccc;">Album Of The Year:</span><br />
<br />
Music is not a competition, so put that in yer pipe. If a gun was pointed at my head, it might be All Them Witches' fabulous racket...or any of the others I gave three shiny asterisks...heck, I don't know!<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Well, that's it, then, apart from this...<br />
<br />
Schroedinger, you know, he of cat fame; I'll bet had he been around at the time would have been a mahoosive prog fan, probably inclined towards impossibly complex theoretical quantum prog. He would have hummed Henry Cow's <i>Terrible as an Army with Banners</i> in the shower, that one.<br />
<br />
If I may, I will posit the theory of Schroedinger's Prog Album. If I ignore the annual 706 albums of mostly regressive and anally retentive nonsense that block up my auditory pipes, then they do not actually exist in my universe.<br />
<br />
Therefore, no longer do I have to worry about never getting around to reviewing Galadriel's Tumescent Tapeworm's pointless epic <i>The Boy, The Unicorn, and The Bearded Clam Shed</i>...or even Stevie Boy's <i>Boney Thing</i>. Ipso factum, QED, and indeed, wahey!<br />
<br />
Ah, the relief! This is lower colonic irrigation for the soul, you really should try it.<br />
<br />
That really is it, and finally..Thank you, kindly...<br />
<br />
Thanks must go out this year as every year to anyone who puts up with my raving and occasionally salient verbiage both in the imaginary world where I am a lickspittle to Lester Bangs, and the real one, where I am simply a grumbling old scrote. Anyways...have a spiffing Yuletide and we will meet on the other side, to shimmy some more.<br />
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Also, a special hail thee well (virtually) met to my American Farcebook mate Shawn Dudley, who apart from gifting his ongoing photographic diary of the American Fantasyland he lives in....that's L.A. to us mere mortals, has this year, knowingly or otherwise reintroduced me to the RIFF, and thereby to righteous rock'n'roll. In this list those two essential ingredients are supplied mostly by All Them Witches and Elder, two American bands I would probably have let zoom by unnoticed were it not for Shawn's insistence. Ta, muchly! :)Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-6586917913901063822017-11-19T16:47:00.000+00:002017-11-19T16:47:55.559+00:00The MOJO CD - 2017 The Best Of The Year<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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The first of the year's "best ofs", for some reason MOJO's CD contains a couple of tracks from reissues, as if there isn't enough new music to fill the 80 minutes of the disc, which of course is nonsense. As usual it is a largely populist-centric shiny disc, with a few obscure albeit mainstream entries for that "hip" factor, and as ever there are some glaring omissions. Even if we forget my home in the more esoteric hovels at the end of the rock spectrum, why no UNKLE, or Laura Marling, for starters? Anyway, here goes...<br />
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<b>The War On Drugs - Pain</b><br />
Possibly the worst band name currently extant? Actually despite the title this is quite pleasant, in a diluted electrified Waterboys stylee.<br />
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<b>Songhoy Blues - Bamako</b><br />
The funky afros git down. Not bad, at all.<br />
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<b>Paul Weller - Satellite Kid</b><br />
Paul Weller is 60 next year.<br />
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<b>Ghostpoet - Immigrant Boogie</b><br />
The heaviest thing here, musically and lyrically, it lurches along while the main man imagines the unimaginable plight of refugees marooned at sea. Easily the best track on this compilation.<br />
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<b>Sparks - Unaware</b><br />
Sparks are one those very few bands who get better with age. A song about the crushing ennui of modern living that awaits a wee innocent babby.<br />
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<b>Nadia Reid - Right On Time</b><br />
Everton 1980s midfielder Peter Reid's daughter sings a song about a last minute winner against Wimbledon that kept the team up, to an avant-metal backing. Or...a song from MOJO's No.2 album of the year that is pleasant enough, as it dream-pops along. 10000 Maniacs did this kind of thing decades ago, but hopefully it resonates more within the confines of the album.<br />
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<b>Hurray For The Riff Raff - Hungry Ghost</b><br />
"Hurray"? Wassat, then? A decent lively guitar pop number, but nowt to write home about to be honest.<br />
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<b>Peter Perrett - An Epic Story</b><br />
No-one is more amazed that Mr Perrett still walks among us than Mr Perrett himself, it seems. Here, he sings a touching love song to his wife, without whom, etc... <i>How The West Was Won</i> is a classy album that shows the louche Only Ones front man still writes a pithy lyric.<br />
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<b>This Is The Kit - Hotter Colder</b><br />
Murky African-sounding folk moves by Kate Stables that would have benefited from a cleaner production, or any production at all come to think of it. Another one that floats by without making much of an impression.<br />
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<b>Endless Boogie - Back In '74</b><br />
I have no idea if this is typical of this band, but to me they sound like a swamp rock version of The Doors with an earnest "singer" narrating in sub-Jimbo fashion about watching Kiss in 1974 while flying kites on bad acid, and getting bottled for having shaved eyebrows. Nope, me neither...<br />
Underneath is a decent retro-rock soundtrack, although All Them Witches would make gumbo stew out of this lot.<br />
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<b>Alice Coltrane - Er Ra</b><br />
Timeless psychedelic devotional goodness with harp, from MOJO's Reissue Of The Year.<br />
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<b>Julie Byrne - Natural Blue</b><br />
Dreamy folk, nice but inconsequential.<br />
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<b>Lal & Mike Waterson - Shady Lady</b><br />
The second reissue on this compilation. Bluesy rootsy folk, with strained harmonies, as I'm sure you know. I prefer the Iron Butterfly song of the same name.<br />
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<b>Richard Dawson - Ogre</b><br />
Ramshackle seven-minute left-field folk epic. Reminds me of Kevin Coyne. At least it's a tad different.<br />
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<b>Oumou Sangaré - Yere Faga</b><br />
A brooding Malian dance number about suicide. Yeah, baby! Actually, it's rather good.<br />
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All in all, a disappointing disc that gives the impression it was rather thrown together at the last minute without a lot of thought. Usually, MOJO's end of year round ups while being more mainstream than my usual fare, often include some interesting sounds new to me that require further investigation. With the possible exception of Richard Dawson, not this time, I'm afraid.<br />
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5/10 - must try harder.Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-35371069278978357622017-11-05T15:30:00.000+00:002017-11-05T18:04:08.428+00:00Frank Zappa - Halloween 77<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<i>Halloween 77</i> is an unusual box set containing all six concerts that were filmed for the <i>Baby Snakes</i> movie, with all the music in high-res WAV on a USB stick, and a Zappa Halloween costume and mask. Or, for those of us with more sense than money and no desire to have six concerts with the same set list, a mere 3-CD version of Uncle Frank's celebration of that lovely American cheesy horror fest and primary school bullies' night out Halloween at The Palladium, NYC, containing the whole set from the 31st October show.<br />
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A collision of extraordinary musicianship and occasionally toe-curling non-PC, some might say mysoginist lyrics that defies categorisation, <i>Halloween 77</i> showcases a band that are drilled to perfection, and the musicianship on display here is of the highest quality. Thankfully the worst of the lyrics are only a minor intrusion into this gargantuan musical feast, and even the base scatalogical humour of the lyrically cringeworthy <i>Punky's Whips</i> is eventually overshadowed by some mesmerising musical derrring-do. Mind you, the less said about <i>Bobby Brown Goes Down</i>, the better. Shut Up, and Play yer Guitar, indeed. Incidentally, listening to the intro of this version of <i>Punky's Whips</i> makes you realise where the roots of the then unknown second guitarist and all-round Zappa foil Adrian Belew's 80s Crimson classic <i>Indiscipline</i> came from.<br />
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The first Zappa album I bought new was <i>Zoot Allures</i> in 1976, and most of that album is included in the set list. <i>Black Napkins</i> has always remained my favourite Frank Zappa guitar excursion, and, daft as it sounds its inclusion here was the main reason I bought this triple CD set. There is also a half-hour long (!) version of <i>Wild Love</i> from <i>Sheik Yerbouti</i>, most of which was recorded at marathon sessions thinly disguised as rehearsals for these gigs, although the album itself was not released until 1979.<br />
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Boy, could Frank write a tune, as well as being a great entertainer, witness <i>Halloween Audience Participation Time</i>, aka "A re-enactment of the sum total of human civilisation" which includes a blast at Warner Bros. Records, whom Frank had acrimoniously left not long before, and audience members administering discipline to each other on stage. It ends with Frank as ringmaster getting the entire audience to attempt to dance to the impossible time signatures contained within the otherwise straight 4/4 of <i>The Black Page #2</i>.<br />
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The final CD is mostly given over to the half-hour long encore, which brings the set up to the three-hour mark. You don't often get bands doing that nowadays, and you can see why Adrian Belew in his brief but amusing and informative essay in the otherwise overly slim and less than comprehensive CD booklet reckons Zappa was the hardest working musician he ever played with, Adrian eventually coming off stage with "that happily-drained feeling, no more to give...". The encore includes the aforementioned <i>Black Napkins</i>, so, I can't hear you asking, "was it worth wading through the rest to get here?" Too damn right, it was!<br />
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After the encore comes the Bonus Section, basically a few extracts from the other five shows and a further near half hour of classy music and Zappa's larking about. There's more comedic audience participation with a dance competition for those who freely admit to being a "chump" and are "definitely unco-ordinated", as the previous night's contest had been for those with "no natural rhythm". No more spoilers, go find out for yourself.<br />
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<i>Halloween 77</i> is without a doubt one the most important archival releases of the year, and even if, like me, your ventures into the wild and wacky world of Frank Zappa are only fleeting, I recommend it highly.<br />
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"Just remember one thing...rock'n'roll is totally preposterous"</div>
Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-92215359035210161422017-09-27T21:48:00.000+01:002017-09-27T22:10:14.762+01:00The MOJO CD - Neu DecadeThis month the MOJO cover CD features sounds from across Western Europe that contributed to the musical zeitgeist that serenaded David Bowie during his brief stint in the German capital in the later years of the 1970s, to tie in with their feature article on Mr Jones' time in Berlin. Twelve of the fifteen tracks are German and the CD forms a loose collection of the less obvious Kosmische Musik of the times, less obvious because more than likely licensing issues prevented the use of the usual suspects. This makes it far more interesting than it might otherwise have been, and <i>Neu Decade</i> seems at times like a trawl through the lesser played slabs of vinyl in my small, yet perfectly formed Krautrock collection.<br />
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Developing free from the constraints of a deeply ingrained blues and latterly, rock'n'roll heritage, these bands and artists naturally ventured well beyond those base building blocks of all British and American alternative musical culture to forge something entirely new from the ruins of post war Germany, and beyond. These musicians lived in a brave new world where electronics and keyboards often took precedence over the electric guitar, with a few very notable exceptions of course, and these pioneering sound technicians were boldly going where no ostensibly "rock" bands had gone before, and in that sense were making truly progressive music.<br />
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<b>Michael Rother - Karussell</b><br />
In keeping with the Bowie-in-Berlin theme it is fitting that the opening track comes from Deutschrock luminary Michael Rother, who was due to collaborate with Bowie in 1977, a pairing that unfortunately didn't come off. This track, from Rother's first solo album sounds like his former band Neu! with electronic motorik rhythms replacing Klaus Dinger's thunder.<br />
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<b>Brainticket - To Another Universe</b><br />
This multi-national band always gave the impression that they were powered by the choicest psychotropic drugz, as this dislocating voyage along misfiring synapses testifies. This track is lifted from the 1973 album <i>Celestial Ocean</i>, a fried trip recounting the "after-life experience of Egyptian kings traveling through space and time", and who am I to argue? Brainticket made much use of narration instead of singing, a gimmick that does wear a bit thin after a while. I can think of a modern band who should take note.<br />
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<b>Amon Düül II - Fly United</b><br />
One of the big names now... this track is lifted from Amon Düül II's 1973 <i>Vive La Trance</i> album. By then, the splinter group "II" from the original Amon Düül agitprop hippy commune had lost some of the more outlandish and experimental musical edge that gave birth to such masterpieces of unclassifiable lysergic wiggery as <i>Phallus Dei</i> and <i>Yeti</i>, but this song is still a fair representation of their loose acid rock vibe.<br />
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<b>Can - Future Days (edit)</b><br />
From the Cologne masters' new singles box set, Damo and the boys craft three minutes, twenty two seconds' worth of seemingly effortless sassy elegance. However, why bother with an edit when the full nine and a half minutes long version awaits you on the LP of the same name, I wonder?<br />
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<b>Cluster - Dem Wanderer</b><br />
Hans-Joachim Roedelius and Dieter Moebius were perhaps the most bookish pair in Deutschrock...well, they were on a par with Schneider and Hütter at least. This intriguing example of what I can only term intellectual ambience from their marvellously rarefied 1976 <i>Sowieoso</i> album goes "sproing" in a fetchingly chin-stroking fashion.<br />
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<b>Deuter - Der Turm/Fluchtpunkt</b><br />
Primitive and experimental, this is what Deutschrock is all about. Listen to this free form piece of music from multi instrumentalist Georg Deuter and you can hear elements common to the early explorations of all the more well known bands that fall into this singularly individualistic category.<br />
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His first album, from which this track is taken was released in 1971 and is simply entitled <i>D</i>. It is something of a below-the-surface classic of the time, since when Deuter has gone on to amass a huge discography of exploratory music.<br />
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<b>Guru Guru - Electric Junk</b><br />
Apart from the later Roedelius track and the album closer, this is as close as anything on this album to rock music. But this is free rock music or ur-rock musik, as Mr Cope would put it. There are no rules, and after charging out of the traps, the LSD takes hold of the elephant as it wastes all before it. About halfway in the whole band decide...heeeyyy...let's talk about this, as they loll about on a burst sofa discussing the next move before a rolling bass line takes the tune down the road in the company of some fine Hendrix inspired wigout. Bloody marvellous! This is from their 1971 second album <i>Hinten</i>, part of a run of unmissable early albums you need to hear if you like having your mind fried by off the wall guitar music with seemingly no precedents.<br />
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The band are led by a wonderfully barking and very powerful drummer by the name of Mani Neumeier, whose Bonzo-on-acid tub thumping wanders up the garden path to Earthly Delights hand in hand with Uli Trepte's thunderous bass. The spearpoint of this unfettered power trio was a guitarist whose untramelled riffing and spiked soloing made for a whole that is a parallel universe Cream, born in a world were the twelve-bar had never been played. Also, the plank spanker has possibly the best name for a guitarist one could possibly wish for - come on down Ax Genrich!<br />
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<b>Popol Vuh - Steh Auf, Zieh, Mich Dir Nach</b><br />
Popol Vuh were formed in 1969 by classically trained pianist Florian Fricke, who, thanks to his rich family was one of the very first owners of a Moog Synthesiser. Depending on which source you believe, it allegedly cost up to DM800,000, and was probably the size of a small shed. Who said prog wasn't a middle class sport? Wanting to take his already reverential music in yet more elegiac directions, Fricke later sold his synth to Klaus Schulze, making him doubly influential in the instrument's beginnings.<br />
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This track is from 1975's <i>Das Hohelied Salomos</i>, the Vuh's sixth album, by which time Fricke's use of the synth is eschewed for a more organic and ethnic approach, with guest musicians playing sitar and tabla.<br />
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<b>Roedelius - Am Rockzipfel</b><br />
A later entry into the fray, this is from Roedelius' first solo album in 1978, and presents us with a very untypical bluesy chug that keeps on breaking down like it realises it doesn't quite belong in this universe. Satisfyingly odd.<br />
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<b>Conrad Schnitzler - Die Rebellen Haben Sich In Den Bergen Versteckt (Schaltkreis Edit)</b><br />
An early member of Tangerine Dream, and Kluster, the pre-Cluster group with Roedelius and Moebius that reflected the harder inital consonant in its steely-edged industrial soundscaping, Conrad Schnitzler went on to have a long solo career. His career-long experimental inclinations are present and correct on this sparse electro march of the robots from 1974.<br />
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<b>Tim Blake - Metro Logic</b><br />
The only Brit on this compilation, Tim Blake was of course a member of Gong, before escaping the mothership in 1975 to make some langorous synth music of his own.<br />
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<b>Pyrolator - Danger Crusing</b><br />
The next three tracks take us into the post-punk era. Pyrolator was ex-DAF member Kurt Dahlke, who here makes some almost friendly, yet icily creepy noise.<br />
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<b>Richard Pinhas - The Last Kings Of Thule (Part 1)</b><br />
Mavellously left-field French guitarist Richard Pinhas of Heldon fame should need no introduction if you've been paying attention, and here we have a track of typical brooding strangitude from the 1979 album <i>Iceland</i>, one I admit I have not heard before and will now be searching out.<br />
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<b>DAF - Bild 4</b><br />
Another entry from the post-punk years, DAF were a full-on music-concrete-with-a-punk-sensibility experience. This is from the group's feral 1979 debut album <i>Ein Produkt der Deutsch Amerikanischen-Freundschaft</i>. Uneasy listening to rattle yer fillings.<br />
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<b>Tangerine Dream - Ultima Thule Part 1</b><br />
Pick a tune to represent one of Krautrock's top six bands, in this case West Berlin's Tangerine Dream, whose Edgar Froese first used the words "Kosmiche Music" to define his and his peers' common ground, and it wouldn't be this VERY sub-Floydian throwaway debut single from 1971, that sounds like it should have been recorded in 1967. Still, a strangely neat end to an interesting CD, nonetheless.<br />
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As ever with these magazine CDs, there are some obvious and some not so obvious omissions. It is a shame that there is no Ash Ra Tempel from their early "guitar" daze, a band so out on limb they made Guru Guru sound like a completely rational proposition, but for anyone unfamiliar with all but the most well-known German rock of the 1970s this is not a bad compilation at all.<br />
<br />Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-40218811695708333602017-09-23T11:48:00.001+01:002017-09-23T15:25:05.171+01:00When is a review not a review? When it goes Grrrrnnnnggghh, that's when...<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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This started out as a review of an album entitled <i>Synchromysticism</i> by a band of renegades calling themselves Yowie...<br />
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Apparently first used after an incident in Prague Castle in 1618 that initiated the Thirty Years War, “defenestration” is the act of throwing someone out of a window. This begs the question that, being Prague, it must have been spoken in Slavic tongue and therefore was not “defenestration” at all, but some semi-guttural utterance us pampered Anglos would have no hope of pronouncing. Anyway, nitpicking at the technical niceties of language while simultaneously having a dig at the limitations of Wikipedia aside, the drummist and de-facto leader of this band of American lunatics goes by the name of Defenestrator. If that isn’t a reason to review an album I don’t know what is, and boy, do I need a reason right now.<br />
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You see over the past couple of months I have lost my writing mojo, and no doubt that provokes a sigh of relief from you, dear long-suffering reader. In fact if you’re still reading this, you are one of only thirteen people worldwide who do not merely skim-read these missives, and for that I commend you. If I were giving out prizes you would get an overripe banana sent by elf piloted moose to any destination you choose. I'm not so you'll have to make do with feeling superior...it works for me!<br />
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Actually I haven’t so much lost my mojo – as this stream of liquid brown stuff proves – as I am increasingly despairing at the incessant tsunami of musical flotsam, jetsam, sewage, and worse, that rises in never-ending huge waves and breaks over the collective hard drives at Astounded by Sound Towers, falling away to leave behind piles of indistinguishable fare that 40 years ago would not have got much further than the limited imaginations of its creators. I include much-lauded name acts in this invective as I do the most unknown of amateur bedroom musicians.<br />
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The rock era is dead, there are no stars any more. Cynical exploitation knows no bounds and now includes tours of holograms of dead rock stars fronting bands of bewildered musos who must be wondering what the very fuck they’re doing there...oh yeah, it’s a wage, ain’t it? The latest of these farces, following on from the pioneering “Ronnie James Dio”, is the Zappa estate’s latest bid to kill off the career of the only true representative of the great man’s music, his son Dweezil, by way of a hologram of the icon fronting gawd knows who as a backing band. Whoever they are should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves. Next up, watch as the tour industry for actual living bands and musos dies on its feet as this new Frankenstein’s monster in the nostalgia industry eats up all before it in an orgy of race-to-the-bottom capitalismos, co-sponsored by the shiniest of regulation sidestepping teflon-coated taxi apps. Get driven to the gig, and possibly home if you’re lucky, but via the woods, by an un-vetted leering psychopath who puts up with being paid £2.31 an hour by his “employer”, because it gives him the chance to indulge his dark obsessions. Imagine said swivel-eyed dribbler delivering you to your favourite bar to watch “Frank Sinatra” fronting “The Sex Pistols” while you enjoy a hummus burger with mogo chips served on an upturned toilet seat. Actually, don’t imagine that at all, it’s not good for the soul. At the going down of the sun and between the jumpers for goalposts, it’s all our fault ultimately as “we” will head off in droves to watch these atrocity shows while real culture dies starving.<br />
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Oh...hang on...<i>Synchromysticism</i> by Yowie....it’s certainly different, to a point. They obviously love Ruins. I'll review it properly, later...maybe. To be fair to them, you can hear it all <a href="https://yowie.bandcamp.com/album/synchromysticism">HERE</a>.<br />
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That is all, now go and away and do something useful like hacking into the mainframe of a hologram projection company and turning all their holograms into Hitler...or summat.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWl6lfLzcEQYOerkwm4yv0iuW_iE4NrjZiZ2pENr6sTCE7zqvTerVWg2xXZ51AJjgbiq7IsIt22rWpxrIu2G1XakTYnde19rUGfjtoFSemB4jCbdvGMzX1LaLoq8u2xCpZc0jN1gtzQYHw/s1600/adolf.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="852" data-original-width="580" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWl6lfLzcEQYOerkwm4yv0iuW_iE4NrjZiZ2pENr6sTCE7zqvTerVWg2xXZ51AJjgbiq7IsIt22rWpxrIu2G1XakTYnde19rUGfjtoFSemB4jCbdvGMzX1LaLoq8u2xCpZc0jN1gtzQYHw/s320/adolf.jpg" width="217" /></a></div>
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Yours explosively, Roger McNastyRoger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-46620317317229799112017-09-10T22:08:00.001+01:002017-09-10T22:13:38.989+01:00V Ä L V Ē - #1 [the theosophical society]<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqGT9RtdrzIrbG-JXnwb7QF3x0tu6p3ibm1pzfWXSC1z5qa3_Hf7-QrERsKh4B8KTJJGmKrtHCWunL-EcYzyzvzpGh3mbT4f3ctxGG0LwZl5f8TRNUFv6SGrI3W6FzaUvg-FEYdMXyeGYn/s1600/valve.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1186" data-original-width="1200" height="316" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqGT9RtdrzIrbG-JXnwb7QF3x0tu6p3ibm1pzfWXSC1z5qa3_Hf7-QrERsKh4B8KTJJGmKrtHCWunL-EcYzyzvzpGh3mbT4f3ctxGG0LwZl5f8TRNUFv6SGrI3W6FzaUvg-FEYdMXyeGYn/s320/valve.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
With every other member of Knifeworld being involved in at least three other bands as well as having parallel solo careers, as musicians, DJs, and sword swallowers, it would be remiss of the Knives' resident bassoonist Chloe Herington to sit at home putting up shelves, don't you think? She did too, so with the help of "a spectacular array of rather fetching collaborators" adding saxophones, found sounds, and fragile electronica, this somewhat beguiling EP was produced.<br />
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It sounds like anything that required electricity to power it was plugged into a single socket in next door's garage while they weren't looking via stacked three-plug adapters, such is the tottering fragility of the music herein. Some say that avant garde music is often unnecessarily indulgent, and wilful for the sake of it, but this is another creature entirely, blown on the winds of a febrile imagination.<br />
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If I am forced to describe this music in two words, that epithet is "dangerously cute", or maybe "cutely dangerous". <i>#1 [the theosophical society] </i>is a taster for a forthcoming album rather discomfitingly entitled <i>Silent Reflux</i>, which despite the name I look forward to with heightened curiosity, pricked further awake by the appearance of a fully formed song in the last track here, <i>lights</i><i>. #1 [the theosophical society]</i> has inculcated itself with that song, and I require more.<br />
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<b>Tracklist:</b><br />
1. atmos #1 (6:18)<br />
2. {da} FEM (3:14)<br />
3. futures (4:27)<br />
4. lights (4:24)<br />
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Total running time - 18:23<br />
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<b>Line up:</b><br />
Chloe Herington - voice, shelf, bass, melodica, percussion<br />
Elen Evans - harp, voice<br />
Emma Sullivan - microkorg, voice<br />
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<b>Links:</b><br />
<a href="https://valvemusic.bandcamp.com/album/1-the-theosophical-society">Bandcamp</a><br />
<a href="https://www.facebook.com/valvemusic/">Facebook</a>Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-55145718733542636352017-08-12T09:48:00.000+01:002017-08-12T09:48:24.981+01:00Colouratura - Colouratura<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi59r2yh3u5aQgJVYf_klYjyneoGJSv28GcmVIuub4E8veCSLkXzmQVbeiqsfMGhYDNdLf12wYBHKsfVt0u1l8V9CtIekhZOwMFeYesA9vugHrZW9xjMjpqZtUXwQW_YB51_3rB9IHx25pC/s1600/cover.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1417" data-original-width="1417" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi59r2yh3u5aQgJVYf_klYjyneoGJSv28GcmVIuub4E8veCSLkXzmQVbeiqsfMGhYDNdLf12wYBHKsfVt0u1l8V9CtIekhZOwMFeYesA9vugHrZW9xjMjpqZtUXwQW_YB51_3rB9IHx25pC/s320/cover.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
"Colouratura - n. elaborate ornamentation of a vocal melody, especially in operatic singing."<br />
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So says the dictionary, and thankfully we can ignore what follows the comma, but the rest applies.<br />
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An album made in small hours in their spare time by Nathan James, who wrote the music, and Ian Beabout who twiddled knobs in his fast becoming inimitable fashion, this unusual trip throws the genre book out the window. Over the course of its 50 minutes, a seamless journey split into definable songs or tracks for convenience, but playing as one piece, <i>Colouratura</i> in its first three tracks covers spectral if unsettling ambience, plaintive ballad and Faustian space rock, which gives an idea of the "scattergun set to stun" nature of this record.<br />
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The height of the realised songwriting on the album arrives on <i>Sea Shanty</i>, which sways along in proto-Procol Harum fashion before a middle eight that rides the swell in triple time. Nathan James is a fine singer with a good range and emotive scope, so much so that pernickety bugger that I am, I can even forgive him very occasionally going slightly wayward with the pitch (no doubt something to do with the yaw) on <i>Sea Shanty</i> as he gives his soul to "For what is a man, if he's not really free? And what is human without dreams and destiny?" What, indeed?<br />
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The title track is a love song accompanied by lone piano, and the obviously needed bridge of <i>The Other Side</i> takes us straight into the baroque-prog territory of <i>Jekyll.Hyde</i>, which puts me in mind of The Stranglers from their <i>Meninblack</i> phase. Enlivened by Dave Newhouse's sax, an air of menace permeates proceedings as Nathan's treated voice sings his fatalistic lyric to us. A degree of continuity brings us the suitably creepy <i>Old Nightmares</i>, introduced by a piano in a Gothic setting, and like a Hammer movie, the horror is with an element of cheese. "There are voices in my head, and I can't get them out, but I can't let them in...I think I'm losing my mind" our narrator tells us along with mentions of "the witching hour", "evil" and Vincent Price cackling. Mmmwwwhahahahaha...<br />
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In fact, from <i>Jekyll.Hyde</i> onwards <i>Colouratura</i> becomes more cohesive, as if the spirits have aligned in a world of Gothic pop, confronting death, war, and the big Q<i>uestions</i>, the latter ending the album in a punky charge as the sun comes up over the mixing desk.<br />
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All bases are, if not covered, at least fleetingly visited on this never-a-dull-moment album of after hours winding down (and up), and it has developed a life of its own along the way. "A labour of love, and it shows" says Ian Beabout, but warts and all this is a fun ride through two mates letting off steam at the end of stressful days out there in the increasingly insane "real" world. The Matrix is broken, and this is part of the soundtrack.<br />
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<b>Tracklist:</b><br />
1. Cacophony (4:24)<br />
2. Questions? (3:15)<br />
3. Space Western (4:07)<br />
4. Sea Shanty (6:55)<br />
5. Colouratura (4:00)<br />
6. The Other Side (1:22)<br />
7. Jekyll.Hyde (7:57)<br />
8. Old Nightmares (6:08)<br />
9. Until You Slip Away (5:49)<br />
10. Hymn (2:47)<br />
11. Questions (3:14)<br />
<br />
Total running time - 49:58<br />
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<b>Line up:</b><br />
Nathan James - voice, piano, bass, guitar, keyboard, percussion, ARP 2600<br />
Ian Beabout - flute, treatments, narration, dragon breaths<br />
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With:<br />
<br />
Ryan Smurthwaite - guitar<br />
Brandon Collins - drums, cajon, guitar, whistle<br />
Dave Newhouse - woodwinds<br />
Connor Reilly - drums<br />
Evyenia Karapolous - voice<br />
Damon Waitkus - guitar, slide guitar<br />
<br />
Links:<br />
<a href="https://colouratura.bandcamp.com/releases">Bandcamp</a><br />
<br />
<br />Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-45184357973553529262017-07-28T13:50:00.000+01:002017-07-29T14:48:30.963+01:00The Fall - New Facts Emerge<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjashGieCNQvXzSNw1UU8C8WgHvT-emV4jyJWNu_JymtToG-dZFchtCE2p2gnXwmsBkbwPfVI_Y9_yAXYdIz_aOtxhomeVUfikHkjXLiYLvUOpuzeI4kYW9aLOnW9Tjh5Ub3vF-mwNtLpvf/s1600/New-Facts-Emerge-Cover.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1600" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjashGieCNQvXzSNw1UU8C8WgHvT-emV4jyJWNu_JymtToG-dZFchtCE2p2gnXwmsBkbwPfVI_Y9_yAXYdIz_aOtxhomeVUfikHkjXLiYLvUOpuzeI4kYW9aLOnW9Tjh5Ub3vF-mwNtLpvf/s320/New-Facts-Emerge-Cover.jpg" width="320"></a><i>New Facts Emerge</i> is the 32nd album from that strange mental institution burning that goes by the name of The Fall. Led by Mark E. Smith, it is entirely probable that you or I is at least distantly related to someone who has been in The Fall, or at the very least is only three steps removed from a plucky musician with a career death wish to back Smith's by now embarrassingly random splutterings. They seem to be drawn to Smith like moths to a flame, and he has got through approximately 70 of the poor fuckers since crawling out of Prestwich with the first line up back in 1976.<br>
<br>
Over the years this band has belted out some stonkingly classic records, and even now and well beyond their prime have until fairly recently managed to pepper their albums with blasts of righteous indignation that make the former fan such as I still occasionally part with readies for a shiny disc. Yes, we still buy CDs, for like Mr Smith we are now quite old. The last time I did this was back in 2008 for <i>Imperial Wax Solvent</i> purely on the strength of that marvellous old bloke empowerment anthem, <i>50 Year Old Man</i>. That they actually played that song the last time I saw them live in 2011 was a minor miracle in itself as Smith's dictum has always been "Never look back", for which he can only be applauded.<br>
<br>
Right...that's the good news. The bad news is that for a while now Smith seems to be doing little more than taking the piss, or letting it leak out, come to think of it. Coincidentally, the track I have playing right now is tellingly entitled <i>O! Zztrrk Man</i>, a title almost as unintelligible as the deliberately distorted and garbled (yarbled?) declaiming by the cult leader as he slumps in the darkest corner of the most downmarket cheap shit room imaginable, a two-thirds drunk pint of cheap lager next to his slumped head as it burbles incoherently into a pool of beer, drool, and fag ash. That about sums it up - Smith could make a recording of his bathroom noises and set it to the competent but uninspiring backing of his latest bunch of poor drone-slaves, and the regulation 19706 units would be shifted to the supplicants who will then declare it nectar from the gods to anyone who will listen. Unfortunately for them, some of us old fuckers still have our discernment faculties intact, fangyewverymuch.<br>
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OK, maybe it's not THAT bad - <i>Gibbus Gibson</i> is actually sung, after a fashion, and though I have no idea what he was singing about, it sounds vaguely melancholic, and possibly even self-reflective. Or is that hoping for too much? You see the problem is, much like the worst excesses of the obese and flatulent arse of prog rock, aka ELP, Mark E. Smith appears to have little or no self awareness, and seems to treat his audience with a similar lofty disdain to the 70s dinosaurs. Ironic that, doncha think?<br>
<br>
By the time this grating record gets round to the last track, the almost prog-length nine minute <i>Nine Out Of Ten</i>, I just want it to stop, much like The Fall themselves. To think this sad spectacle once used to be genuinely cutting edge and singularly magnificent. Unfortunately, this album is nowhere near nine out of ten, and no new facts have emerged, it simply confirms my worst suspicions. <br>
Bloody sad, really.Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-3043766657814352802017-07-14T22:57:00.002+01:002017-07-14T23:37:44.173+01:00Jumble Hole Clough - Go and play quietly by yourself<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwY5GwWWrRNbWiip0jf3c2BGEGP5K4S2Ilx8dPpDx0_31mmwA25Enc2S39uUg_GkhYVyo__66R5Ddfa3d8OxajXzWVZDr4FPmQs0UEjtnxR28phhTxkXcYgy4DFOMLG_8moJEkPRHPbOBW/s1600/jhc+-+play.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1197" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwY5GwWWrRNbWiip0jf3c2BGEGP5K4S2Ilx8dPpDx0_31mmwA25Enc2S39uUg_GkhYVyo__66R5Ddfa3d8OxajXzWVZDr4FPmQs0UEjtnxR28phhTxkXcYgy4DFOMLG_8moJEkPRHPbOBW/s320/jhc+-+play.jpg" width="318" /></a></div>
Foreclose on the definite, obliterate all expectations. From the building blocks start anew. Reconnect the heart to the mind via the spidery funk line. Dangle a proposition and attach it to the running board of a runaway bus, for this is the start of a new adventure. The unknown is not un-named, it is <i>Go and play quietly by yourself</i>, the 758th album this epoch from Jumble Hole Clough, a possibly imaginary concept that exists both before and after Schrodinger opens his box in the troubled hamlet of Hebden Bridge yesterday. The tree fell in the forest, no-one observed it apart from Colin Robinson who wrote a tune about something else entirely called <i>Skin & Hide</i> that combined pop and the fractured dissonance of our troubled souls. "Goat and gland, Autonomy in hand, Don’t fill your ear full of sand".<br />
<br />
Colin's work will engage your noggin as well as make you smile, possibly at one and the same time. This is the kind of multi-tasking I can cope with. Colin's hovercraft is always full of eels, which is probably why he gets few paying customers. Slippery blighters, eels, and some of these sprout wings and fly off dripping and shimmering before being sucked into the turbines of passing budget airliners, flying low to see if they can ascertain where all this goddam interference is coming from.<br />
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Can you send me one of <i>Santa's Swearing Elves</i> for Xmas?<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<iframe seamless="" src="https://bandcamp.com/EmbeddedPlayer/album=105375948/size=large/bgcol=ffffff/linkcol=0687f5/tracklist=false/artwork=small/transparent=true/" style="border: 0; height: 120px; width: 100%;"><a href="http://jumbleholeclough.bandcamp.com/album/go-and-play-quietly-by-yourself">Go and play quietly by yourself by Jumble Hole Clough</a></iframe></div>
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You can get this sequence of noises <a href="https://jumbleholeclough.bandcamp.com/album/go-and-play-quietly-by-yourself">HERE</a>, and Colin invites you to Name Your Price. It would be good if you bought it for cash money, he needs a new shovel to bury all those dismembered eels that fell from the sky and landed in his front garden t'other day...Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-38446577105520466902017-06-10T16:36:00.000+01:002017-06-10T16:36:49.549+01:00Schnauser - Irritant<div class="MsoNormal">
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Madness, they call it madness...</div>
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In my fevered
imaginings I would like to think that the annoyingly over-capable DIY Sturmführer Dick Strawbridge, he of the unfeasibly
humungous moustache and loveable teddy bear persona was playing the Midi-kazoo for <i>Schnauser</i>, the wonderfully strange yet cuddly combo from Bristol,
as they cavort around the stage playing <i>Have You Got PPI?</i>, a particularly loose-limbed number from
their fabulously tumescent new album <i>Irritant</i>. In my peculiar fantasy, Dick looks
proudly over to his son, guitarist and singist Alan as he belts out the wonky
wonderfulness that comprises Schnauser’s weird yet perfectly self-contained universe, as strange tiny creatures synchronously writhe about in Dad's bristling upper lip hair monster.<o:p></o:p></div>
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In other news it turns out that "We are the brainworm" as the Nutty Boys play klezmer, and enquiries are made by chanting girl choruses asking "Have You Got PPI?" while a craftily purloined cheesy synth line from Bowie's <i>Sound And Vision</i> burbles away. Above all this lunacy, the melody is king and queen, and on the lilting but portentous <i>Fail Better</i>, the lyric implores the listener to get off their collective ass and try again. Failure may be the only option, but goddamn, do it better! A curiously fatalistic take on the Protestant work ethic that no doubt has crossed all our horizons at some point. On the other hand "Get yourself a life boy, get yourself a life girl" as the broiling sounds of wildly careening guitar, saxes and and noises off permeate the stately pace of the melody. Groovy feckers, this Schnauser band, who have caused my newsfeed to be inundated with adverts for the International Schnauzer Society, Alsatians For Jesus, and Poodles On Stumps, the bastards...the band, not the doggies, c'mon.<br />
<br />
The club band at the local Latino Disco strike up here and there with a carefree joyfulness that flies in the face of the heavy manners of these perma-weird times. <i>Hypertension</i> is only displayed in the tune's title as this infectious instrumental does odd things with your pelvis. The album title is another misnomer, for this fab record is about as annoying as being given a full body massage by...insert your fantasy rubdown applier here. She or he is however suffering from a caffeine overdose, won't stop talking while chewing his or her bottom lip. It's a small price to pay.<br />
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<i>A New Atmosphere</i> is a snake-hipped bossa nova for dancers with at least two left feet. This thing schwings, baby, in a louche Hatfields kinda fashion, before briefly meeting 10:15 as it furtively leaves the bedroom, then subsequently descending to the bottom of the well, where workers go blind making mustard gas shells. There be an underlying seriousness at work, doncha know? They even get in a good old rant against the Bullingdon Bullies and turkeys voting for Xmas on <i>The Monday Club</i>, another musically satisfying trip through a series of vaguely familiar motifs, that as a whole make for the knee-flexing Schnauser Sound, ending like early Roxy swirling away down the plug hole.<br />
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It is over two and a half years since <i>Schnauser</i>'s last album, the defiantly odd <i>Protein For Everyone</i>, and the Bristolians have refined their once fierce quirkiness into a gloriously fun experience. <i>Irritant</i> is just right for these surreal summer months as collective madness descends upon this benighted nation. The ongoing Schadenfreude Party is going to be a long one, methinks. All hail Supreme Leader Boris as we barf into our soup.<br />
<br />Sorry, got sidetracked there...Gleaning the influences that inspire this record is like lowering a net into an over-populated fish tank and coming up with a bewildering variety of writhing aquatic wildlife. This smorgasbord of delights is the combination of everything you can think of, from Cardiacs, through Madness, to Ivor Cutler via The Beatles and very early Daevid Allen/Kevin Ayers' Soft Machine, and on to Syd's Floyd, Berlin Bowie and XTC. As a result it cannot be pigeonholed for convenience.<br />
<br />
Just give it a listen over on Bandcamp, for it bears bounteous gifts. Hopefully, this drooling missive might make you curious enough to buy it. Right. I'm off to join The Chocolate Labrador Motorcyle Club...</div>
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<b>Tracklist:</b></div>
<ol start="1" style="margin-top: 0cm;" type="1">
<li class="MsoNormal"><o:p>Spiele Mit Katzen (4:21)</o:p></li>
<li class="MsoNormal">Chinese Brainworm (Taenia Solium) (4:48)</li>
<li class="MsoNormal">Re-Mortgaging The Nest Of Hair (4:12)</li>
<li class="MsoNormal">Sorry, You Were Out... (1:24)</li>
<li class="MsoNormal">Have You Got PPI? (4:44)</li>
<li class="MsoNormal">How About A Kiss? (4:06)</li>
<li class="MsoNormal">Fail Better (6:35)</li>
<li class="MsoNormal">Hypertension (4:15)</li>
<li class="MsoNormal">A New Atmosphere (8:22)</li>
<li class="MsoNormal">The Monday Club (7:43)</li>
<li class="MsoNormal">Speile-Jangle (Reprise) (2:17)</li>
</ol>
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Total running time - ...about as long as a couple of very leisurely pints, or the time it takes Kat to saunter up the garden at 2:30am, catch, bring home and devour a luckless rodent, at the foot of our bed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Line up:</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Alan Strawbridge – guitars, vocals<br />
Dino Christodoulou – tenor and soprano saxophones, vocals<br />
Duncan Gammon – keyboards, vocals<br />
Holly Mcintosh – bass guitar, vocals<br />
Jasper Williams – drums, vocals</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><br /></b>
<b>Links:</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="https://schnauser.bandcamp.com/album/irritant">Bandcamp</a> </div>
<span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;"><a href="https://www.facebook.com/SchnauserMusic">Facebook - Schnauser</a> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times new roman" , "serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;"><a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/686267298089094/?ref=br_rs">Facebook - Bad Elephant Music</a></span><br />
<br />
Footnote: No YouTube video available for this album, though if you type "Schnauser Irritant" into YT's search engine the first vid is the instructional "How to keep your mini-schnauzer's beard unstained", which you might find useful. Glad to be of help.Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-46474013200229425332017-05-20T17:48:00.001+01:002017-12-07T15:06:42.189+00:00faUSt - Fresh Air<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbRrhcjPVLe_M21ZXomvtR8XWM93sYJXK6ujJP-g5eZHLhyN67SYDBdb6wZsggjACNk8CBglzHg9ZOxj2TOnw-slttWC9_8xsAtZjl5UQKVmv9wiPw-gm-BfluIvElg8a1m9cXFto4hSzD/s1600/bb_254_faust_fresh_air_1500px_rgb.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbRrhcjPVLe_M21ZXomvtR8XWM93sYJXK6ujJP-g5eZHLhyN67SYDBdb6wZsggjACNk8CBglzHg9ZOxj2TOnw-slttWC9_8xsAtZjl5UQKVmv9wiPw-gm-BfluIvElg8a1m9cXFto4hSzD/s320/bb_254_faust_fresh_air_1500px_rgb.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
"All we need...is fresh air in our brain" declaims the propulsive opening title track to this driven and tribal album, recorded on a tour of the USA in 2016, and Faust...or is it faUSt..., the rhythmic engine room of Krautrock are back on my radar after an absence of some years.<br />
<br />
Seems like I have some catching up to do, as true to their anarchic spirit, there appears to be two versions of the band currently in existence. The version we find here, spelling themselves faUSt, no doubt after their long American connection, are steered by bassist and singer Jean-Hervé Peron ("jhp.art-terrorist") and drummer Werner Diermaier ("Zappi"). They are the most active of the two versions, having released a handful of albums since 2009, and they tour fairly regularly.<br />
<br />
<i>Fresh Air </i>kicks off with the mammoth title track, which for the first half of its length is a dreamy synth-led ambient wander through a Polish translation of part of a work by French poet, painter, musician and performance artist Joël Hubaut entitled <i>Put Put Epidemik</i>, essentially an increasingly surreal list of the desires of the protagonist. The female narrator declaims "Chciałbym", or "I would like" followed by increasingly surreal pronouncements such as "antennas and jaws", or "eyes on the floor of my mouth", to name but two. The full translation can be found <a href="https://translate.google.co.uk/translate?hl=en&sl=fr&u=http://joelhubaut.jujuart.com/put_put.html&prev=search">HERE</a>. Eventually the band join in and establish a primitive and relentless but nonetheless hypnotic motorik rhythm, with accompanying distorted guitars and declamations, this time in English, on where we need fresh air. All quite bizarre, and so utterly Faust...or is it faUSt. To borrow John Peel's famous description of The Fall, this band are "always different, always the same", and I wouldn't have it any other way.<br />
<br />
Here is a fabulous live set, filmed last year, featuring the line up from most of this album...<br />
<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
Actually when you get down to it, there is quite a similarity with The Fall apparent in many places on this record, the disinterested vocals of Barbara Manning on <i>Lights Flickr</i>, the general anarchic and uncompromising air, the joy in repetition, the surreal and declamatory lyrics, it's all there. Mind you it is no secret that MES is a big Krautrock fan, especially of Can, and one suspects, Faust.<br />
<br />
The meaty rhythmic heft of Zappi and jhp is to the fore on <i>Le Poulie</i>, where the pulse of Neu! is given extra energy by righteous anger and ancient synthesisers. The chugging sax on <i>Chlorophyl</i> ends in free jazz territory, continuing into the beginning of the fast, noisy, and feral <i>Lights Flikr, </i>which for me is the album highlight, as Barbara Manning treads a nervous high tension line, telling us...<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
"Lights Flicker as I blink my eyes to the the beat, to the beat, to the beat</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Of his oh so hot drum, I place my mouth over it</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
beat beat beat long strokes, wet</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
the words are like spit"</div>
<br />
This is organic, shamanic, lustful, repulsive and propulsive, turning into a strange tale of exploding heads and parts of corpses found in the washing up. Marvellous!<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
Returning to the sea from whence all life came, <i>Fish</i> is strangely primordial and a warning to end the album, the protagonist praising the sea. "The Sea, the Sea, she is eternal, she saw you when you were a baby", but "She does not mind all the corpses of the refugees...she does not care about our futile problems", all to a familiar yet creepy Faustian drone.<br />
<br />
Uncompromising as ever, faUSt...or is it Faust...continue their unmapped path to who knows where, least of all themselves. The journey continues to be thoroughly engaging, and the band who made <i>The Faust Tapes</i> well over forty years ago, and one of my top five favourite records of all time, continue to surprise.<br />
<br />
<b>Tracklist:</b><br />
1. Fresh Air (17:30)<br />
2. Birds of Texas (2:30)<br />
3. Partitur (0.22)<br />
4. Le Poulie (6:37)<br />
5. Chlorophyl (8:04)<br />
6. Lights Flickr (5:39)<br />
7. Fish (11:22)<br />
<br />
Total running time - 52:07<br />
<br />
<b>Line up:</b><br />
All of this is approximate and gleaned from the live video above...<br />
Jean-Hervé Peron (aka "jhp.art-terrorist") - Bass, guitars, vocals<br />
Werner Diermaier (aka "Zappi") - Drums<br />
Maxime Manac'h - Guitar, percussion<br />
<br />
With:<br />
Ysanne Spevack - Viola (1&7)<br />
Barbara Manning - Vocals (3,5&6)<br />
Beata Budkiewicz - Translation, Declamation (1)<br />
Ulrike Stöve - Vocals (1)<br />
Robert Pepper - Keyboards, electronics, vocals (1&7)<br />
Ulrich Krieger - Saxophone (3,5&6)<br />
Michael Day - Electronics? (3,5&6)<br />
Braden Diotte - Electronics? (3,5&6)<br />
Jürgen Engler - Vocals (4)<br />
<br />
<b>Links</b>:<br />
<a href="https://shop.tapeterecords.com/records/bureaub/faust-fresh-air.html">Bureau B.</a>Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-49605756013666625992017-05-07T15:56:00.000+01:002017-05-07T16:15:36.898+01:00Juxtavoices - Warning: May Contain Notes<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-HOc0chhCjavELKSeitKsn1BsfHJ_xJ4uzDjBZgay-J0Ot1U5fT19BUkB5zYDaCIr4OSFzemLIUj__bJiOUlp7CP-yCTCPNXXfZwGc7NgbEA9PpvXFAX18OLm-saVAGn-KntytR0hT7b3/s1600/jvoices.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="319" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-HOc0chhCjavELKSeitKsn1BsfHJ_xJ4uzDjBZgay-J0Ot1U5fT19BUkB5zYDaCIr4OSFzemLIUj__bJiOUlp7CP-yCTCPNXXfZwGc7NgbEA9PpvXFAX18OLm-saVAGn-KntytR0hT7b3/s320/jvoices.jpg" width="320" /></a><i>Warning: May Contain Notes</i> is the third release from Sheffield-based Martin Archer's Juxtavoices, described by Martin, quite succinctly I feel, as an "antichoir". While the largest proportion of the strange collage of sounds emanating from this CD derives from the large ensemble of human voices, this is not choral work in traditional sense.<br />
<br />
If you arrive at this album having never heard Juxtavoices before, you may well be shocked, but also hopefully intrigued by its sheer otherness to indulge its excesses for a while. I am lucky for I knew what to expect, having already experienced their first album <i><a href="http://astoundedbysound.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/juxtavoices-juxtanother-antichoir-from.html">Juxtanother Antichoir From Sheffield</a></i> some four years ago.<br />
<br />
Juxtavoices is a large conglomerate of singers and performers from the Sheffield avant music and arts scene, and it includes both trained and untrained voices. Although the pieces they perform are scripted, the finer details of the works are improvised, with whistles, chattering, moans, whoops and hollers coming at you across the stereo spectrum in the most unexpected of places.<br />
<br />
We start with <i>Ascent</i> which does just that, slowly climbing a metaphorical staircase to arrive at a rarefied summit. This album was recorded at various locations over a couple of years, and this first piece was recorded at The Golden Lion, Todmorden, which I can only assume is a pub. It must have made an odd accompaniment to a leisurely pint, is all I can say!<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/sguj4Kw0iac" width="560"></iframe></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
The music and texts of the pieces were contributed by four of the choir, and my one criticism of the packaging is that a lyric or text sheet is not included, nor as far as I can see is it provided via an online link, which given the labyrinthine and near-cacophonous nature of a lot of this album would have been a rather useful addition, even if space necessitated it being in highly truncated form. The PR sheet informs me that the compositions "include troubled seascapes, exploding islands, futurist wars, curious wordplay on the subject of aging disreputably, letraset abstraction, a reinterpretation of early Cabaret Voltaire recordings, and a terrifying ascent into the very jaws of hell". Indeed! you can probably work out which is which from the track titles.<br />
<br />
There are so many layers and strands to these works that it will take several listens before you can have any familiarity with the album, which is why I have had this review copy for over four moths before I have been able to even begin to get below its extremely densely packed surface. A piece like <i>An Imp Unity of Dyads</i>, with its musical interjections from percussion, bassoon, glockenspiel, and concertina, contains righteous declamations, multi-voiced spoken words, snatches of song, chatter, and choral harmony, all seemingly reading from different scripts, yet sounding completely deliberate. A unity of two parts perhaps? I have absolutely no idea what it is all about, but it sounds like nothing else on Earth. Planned anarchy, if you will. As the album progresses it gets ever more abstract, and <i>To You & Me, Krakatoa</i> is as unnerving and as cacophonous as an exploding island. At least I understand this one!<br />
<br />
The DVD is an essential part of this package, for the videos that accompany the pieces, put together by audio-visual contrarian Bo Meson do help one unravel some of the more baffling aspects of the CD, where one is left to one's own imagination. <i>Ascent</i>, with its treated colour negative collages of rockets lifting off, and in some cases exploding catastrophically, certainly upped the ante of my cerbral cortex while listening to that one again! We learn via newspaper clippings, adverts from the time and old newsreel that the highly creepy <i>RMMV Asturias</i> is a soundtrack to the maiden voyage and seagoing history of what was then, in 1926, the world's largest motorised ship. Or at least that's the gist of it, although quite how the frequent appearances in the video of a segment of a debt recovery letter fit in, I'm not sure.<br />
<br />
The final track <i>Western Works</i> is Juxtavoices' interpretation of three early tracks by fellow Sheffield oddballs Cabaret Voltaire, whom every punker worth his or her bondage trousers will know for the superb alien disco smash <i>Nag Nag Nag</i>. Some of us even bought a couple of their albums back in the day. Needless to say, what Juxtavoices do with the Cabs' avant derring-do is as utterly different as it is fitting, given the source material. I will describe it no further, you'll just have to buy this very strange offering, and find out for yourself.<br />
<br />
<b>Tracklist - CD</b><br />
1. Ascent (9:04)<br />
2. RMMV Asturias (13:41)<br />
3. An Imp Unity of Dyads (9:57)<br />
4. Helvetica (15:25)<br />
5. To You & Me Krakatoa (11:17)<br />
6. Atavistic Ennui (10:29)<br />
<br />
Total running time - 70:42<br />
<br />
<b>Tracklist - DVD</b><br />
1. An Imp Unity of Dyads (9:58)<br />
2. Ascent (9:02)<br />
3. RMMV Asturias (18:21)<br />
4. Helvetica (21:36)<br />
5. Drawn From No Well (18:44)<br />
6. Western Works (19:41)<br />
<br />
Total running time - 1:37:22<br />
<br />
<b>Line up:</b><br />
Juxtavoices:<br />
Julie Archer, Martin Archer, Jon Ashe, David Bartholomew, Ian Baxter, Mick Beck, Nathan Bettany, Geoff Bright, Chris Bywater, Clinton Chaloner, Julie Cole, Laura Cole, Emma Cooper, Paul Coupe, Edward Eggleston, Kat Fletcher, Sharon Gill, Alan Halsey, Matt Harling, Lyn Hodnett, Maria Kalnars, Christine Kennedy, Bo Meson, Tamar Millen, Geraldine Monk, Rick Moran, Liam Murphy, Tim Plant, Marion Rout, Liz Searle, Wolfgang Seel, Walt Shaw, Jan Todd, Jane Tormey, Caroline Veal, Peter Veal, Linda Lee Welch, Gillian Whiteley.<br />
<br />
With:<br />
Walt Shaw - Electronics and percussion<br />
Nathan Bettany - Oboe<br />
Mick Beck - Bassoon, tenor sax<br />
Gillian Whiteley - Concertina<br />
Martin Archer - Glockenspiel, baritone sax<br />
<br />
<b>Links:</b><br />
Discus Music - Juxtavoices <a href="http://discus-music.co.uk/by-artist-or-group/juxtavoices">page</a><br />
Facebook - <a href="https://www.facebook.com/juxtavoiceschoir/">Juxtavoices</a>Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-70929085712084643862017-04-13T23:22:00.000+01:002017-04-15T12:44:32.304+01:00The Fierce And The Dead - Field RecordingsThe new album from Rushden musical sensation The Fierce And The Dead was going to be called <i>That'll Lern Ya, Me Ol' Booty</i>, but Bad Elephant label boss 'Ard Man Elliott weren't havin' none o'that, me duck, o no. Mr Elliott, issuing dictats from his lair down in That London weren't havin' no peasants 'avin ideas above their station, and so the more prosaic and cash register-friendly <i>Field Recordings</i> it is.<br />
<br />
Last summer, after taking a wrong turn on the way to the Ceynty Teyn to buy a sheep, Farmer Stevens and his ragtag bobtail hayseed dixies ended up at some noisy fair goin' by the name o'Ramblin' Man where they thought they may as well set up stall to display their wares. As we all know, this involves making a mighty fine racket with them electric guitars, amplifiers, and pedal thingies.<br />
<br />
But...there was a problem. Just before they mounted the stage, an almighty argument ensued over the ownership of the last bar of Crunchie in the bottomless tranche of largesse supplied by Mr Elliott, otherwise euphemistically known as "The Rider". All that could be heard were the plaintive cries of "Tent yorn"..."Tent theirs"..."Tent mine"..."Welloosunisit?" Eventually, a scawny stray dog wandered over and 'ad it away. That's that solved then.<br />
<br />
Right, that's enough of that bollocks, just listen to this and pre-order the thing, it'll dislodge those ceramic ducks off yer wall with ease.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<iframe seamless="" src="https://bandcamp.com/EmbeddedPlayer/album=179304695/size=large/bgcol=ffffff/linkcol=0687f5/tracklist=false/artwork=small/track=1223748874/transparent=true/" style="border: 0; height: 120px; width: 100%;"><a href="http://tfatd.bandcamp.com/album/field-recordings-live">Field Recordings (live) by The Fierce And The Dead</a></iframe></div>
Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-56173119576569605842017-04-06T10:02:00.000+01:002017-04-06T12:27:40.703+01:00The Bob Lazar Story - Baritonia<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhe15PIvZkLGMAAMrglrlicexLQurIvpyyO0oDPPqL4uIDGKIPAXloHqGK0kxs_eY0pLXzVIvAP9GEuRBQomYnw2vdIrZLa7JHuOO235_VVI8D1PwmP7wZr7ppjhMcu8lo1dMQpTMUpSFpT/s1600/b+lazar.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhe15PIvZkLGMAAMrglrlicexLQurIvpyyO0oDPPqL4uIDGKIPAXloHqGK0kxs_eY0pLXzVIvAP9GEuRBQomYnw2vdIrZLa7JHuOO235_VVI8D1PwmP7wZr7ppjhMcu8lo1dMQpTMUpSFpT/s320/b+lazar.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
You do realise that yesterday the owner of Everton FC bought the Liver Building, and the Liver Birds will be painted a rightful and justified Royal Blue, to go with our new ground nestling by the Royal Blue Mersey don't you? It's enough for those folk over at Big Stand FC to get their unwashed boxers in a twist.<br />
<br />
...sorry, we have to take our small pleasures where we can. Now, where was I? Oh yes, the new album by Christchurch, NZ based ex-pat Scouser and Mad Koppite Matt Deacon and his American drummist buddy Chris Jago, who record under the name The Bob Lazar Story. Firstly, who was "Bob Lazar", and what is his "Story"? Whomsoever he may be, and whatever be his story (Ed's note - summat to do with UFOs...have you not heard of Google, ya lazy bugger?), this latest chapter entitled <i>Baritonia</i> is more than worthy of your attention, and it is more than fitting that this disparate "band" have ended up on that amorphous collective based in That London, known as Bad Elephant Records. Just as there is no defining a general musical trait that runs through 'ard man Elliott's label, so there is no putting one's finger on Matt's...err...musical pulse, so to speak. He's a slippery devil, and his music is just as lithesome and wriggly, and all the more splendido for that.<br />
<br />
<i>In The Woods With Tony Iommi</i> is the best track title I have seen in a while, and is, I seem to recall, the product of a "Give a track a name" competition. Lawdy knows what the prize was, a collection of Stevie La's nasal hair finger-knitted into a mitten, most probably. Needless to say the track in question is most definitely not heavy metal as it lumbers through the woods in an alternately angular and lumpen fashion, occasionally stooping down to pluck a wild flower. Mr Deacon lays down some fine guitar on this track, as I suppose he would have to, given the title. Like I say, it is deffo not heavy metal, daddio.<br />
<br />
<br />
Here's a video, completely unrelated to this album...<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/rybMfeqyA6U" width="560"></iframe></div>
<br />
Within the strange hinterland of <i>Baritonia</i> you may detect a Zappatista flourish here, or a Crimsoid lurch there, and maybe even a smidgeon of yer Gentle Giantisms, but the whole of this highly tuneful yet wilfully complex amalgam is far more than the sum of any fleeting influences that might be detected. I have spouted nonsensical strings of words about these two reprobates before, so I knew what to expect, but this time round with <i>Baritonia</i> being their first full length album, this ne'er met duo have pulled out all the stops. Simply put, this is a reet little beauty and well worth how ever many ackers Mister Elliott will force from your trembling clutches for it.<br />
<br />
<b>Tracklist:</b><br />
1. Baritonia (6:26)<br />
2. LOL, Definitely (3:51)<br />
3. Eastern Rising (0:18)<br />
4. Make It Like It Used To Be (2:20)<br />
5. Top, Top Switcherooney, Elbow (3:33)<br />
6. In The Woods with Tony Iommi (6:27)<br />
7. Relax For A min, Yeah? (0:56)<br />
8. YNWA, LR (6:41)<br />
9. Blues For Foodstool (1:57)<br />
10. Escape Tits (2:45)<br />
<br />
Total running time - Longer than it takes to say "It's our year", much longer...<br />
<br />
<b>Line up:</b><br />
Matt Deacon - Guitar, gynth (sic), mouse, jaws harp<br />
Chris Jago - Drums, finger cymbal<br />
<br />
<a href="https://theboblazarstory.bandcamp.com/album/baritonia">BUY IT HERE</a> (release date is 14th April, but if you're keen - you should be - you can always pre-order the damn thing, wassamarrerwivyer?)Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6415503202218252360.post-25855659343507376122017-04-01T10:52:00.002+01:002017-04-01T14:53:12.643+01:00A collection of misfits and awkwardness...Permanently snowed under with review downloads, sometimes you need a good virtual enema to clear out the crap...so here's a collection of shorties. some by guest reviewers:<br />
<br />
<b>Dr Watson's Sphincter Assignment - Blessed Are The Proctologists</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
Based in a hut halfway up Mt Snowdon, these Welsh sheep worriers occasionally come down the mountain to gather in a studio to make incomprehensible noise with acoustic instruments, including the Swansea Nose Flute, the aluminium beat box (otherwise known as "a bucket"), primal shouting, banjos and an acoustic guitar with an action that would snap the fingers of lesser men. One track consists of singist Dai Ovine-Evans-Williams screaming "Arse!" in five different local dialects over guest Steve Hackett's coruscating solo, on a loop. Matt Stevens was never like this.<br />
<br />
Roger McNasty<br />
<br />
<br />
<b>Blinkywinky Possibility - Me, A Flower</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
Blinkywinky was once known as Susan Chives, which apparently was her real name until she changed it by deed poll in 1998 following a life-changing acid trip at the Wellingborough Swirly Festival. She makes fetching acoustic dreamscapes and warbles like a shy wombat. Quite luvvly, and only slightly ruined by Steve Hackett's incongruous solo on the otherwise wisp-like <i>I Dream of Clouds</i>.<br />
<br />
Pete Spiggot-Duffy<br />
<br />
<br />
<b>Galadriel's Pet Dragon - Spank The Magic Keyboard</b><br />
<br />
The title being the only thing about it that grabs your attention, this is the kind of thing that makes mainstream music fans point and larf at prawg. This retrograde inspiration-free endless wibble is about as progressive as 45's cabinet, and almost as ugly.<br />
<br />
On one track, the seemingly interminable but "only" half-hour long <i>Breakfast For Gollum</i>, guitarist Mark Mywurdz gets to shred with all the subtlety of of a raging yeast infection, and is about as irritating. When this guy gets going your pet cat will leap from your lap and fly out the room like you just screamed the "vet" word at it. Sadly, one soon finds out that he also knows how to down-tune his guitar, which is unfortunate as it results in endless recycling of those minor key low-end chords that appear on nearly every prog metal album from here to the gates of Mordor.<br />
<br />
Buy this if you are a total moron who thinks that prog = progressive. Kanye West is more progressive than this backward looking festival of ego-wankery.<br />
<br />
Sally Weaselface<br />
<br />
<br />
<b>Crazed Sex Muvva - Helmet Cheese</b><br />
<br />
The Muvva return with their trademark incendiary blasts of bestial noise on their new <i>Helmet Cheese</i> EP. This thing will push your eyeballs way back in your head, and while you are blind with ecstasy. kick you so hard in the nads you won't be able to breathe until it's all over. "But...what's the music like?" I hear you ask. I have abso-fkn-lutley no idea.<br />
<br />
Roger McNasty<br />
<br />
<br />
<b>Brian's Goat-Starting Handle - In Praise of Leaning</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
This is music for the knees. If you can force yourself to sit through its forty eight minutes of ultra-complex lunacy and over-clever machinations, so obviously praying at the altar of the mighty Cow, you will find your patellas will be on the wrong side of legs. Steve Hackett is on this somehere, but you wouldn't know. Rumour has it that he was completely flummoxed by the arrangements and couldn't work out where to fit his solo in.<br />
<br />
Fun, but only for masochists.<br />
<br />
Sheila Fossil<br />
<br />
<br />
<b>Crucifix Symphony - Oil The Hinges Of The Gates Of Hell</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
I mean, just what is the point of prog metal like this? Trying to find originality in this over-populated sewage swamp of a sub-genre is about as easy as finding a social conscience in the Tory Party. Those riffs! Those indecipherable but no doubt puerile lyrics! That hair! Those tattoos! Black...it's all going black...bblllaaacck....nurse, the green pills...mother, o mother....<br />
<br />
Either this lot are masters of irony or completely lack any self-awareness. Only buy this if you are deaf.<br />
<br />
Roger McNasty<br />
<br />
<br />
<b>Genesis - Invisible Touch</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
Waddya mean, this actually exists? (Ed's note - Steve Hackett isn't on this one)<br />
<br />
Lester Bangs<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />Roger Thttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06735262800454812153noreply@blogger.com0