Magic Bullets

Magic Bullets will always be one of my most treasured albums, especially on vinyl, cover art included. I've been listening to lots of Mega City Four this month, thinking of Darren Brown's memory. His voice, these songs, are so personal to me, and with lyrics so full of sensitive, simple wisdom. The band are still a little bit clouded in mystery to me, even with years of fervently collecting so many of their albums and singles on vinyl, as well as yellowed music papers, tattered fanzines, that precious old tape that started it all... yet the music is so close to my heart. But maybe I don't need to have known-by-heart quotes, or any set manifesto/context, or biographies, just this meaningful, moving music - reflective, sad, euphoric, introverted, dreaming. So much heart on sleeve.

Maybe one day I will write that definitive-for-me piece on what the band mean to me; maybe one day I will even tread about Farnborough in a dream... but it'll always be the music ahead of anything else.

Forward For Wiz, the charity set up in memory of Darren Brown/Wiz of Mega City Four is still going strong in supporting new music initiatives: link here.

Of record fairs and Lou Reed

Another welcome record fair from Soundbite in SW London recently. I picked up a Yardbirds collection, and a Who studio album for my dad for Christmas (it's okay, I don't think he has time to read this blog). And I came across New York, a solo album by Lou Reed. I hadn't listened to this album since university days. I remembered taping it off someone at the time, but who knows what dusty box that tape has been residing in. I recalled Romeo had Juliet precisely, but forgot just how good much of the rest of the album is - mainly the run of opening songs. How could I forget all about There is No Time!

Lyrically, this album is superb as well, short-story-like, spoken-word, vivid, got to be one of his best.

I enjoyed coming across this at the record fair, as well as a couple of unexpected Christmas presents for family. It was Small Business Saturday, too. But I largely buy any gifts this time of year from independent traders as a point, anyway. As an aside, there are also some great secondhand music books upstairs in Copperfields book shop in Wimbledon. I bought a biography on Captain Beefheart there not so long ago, which was in perfect condition.

Album covers of the month...

Recently found and been startled by the following album cover designs at a record fair.
They certainly don't make them like this anymore...

It's the bonnet on the end of the guitar that adds the final touch (after you've pondered what kind of singer wants to be pushed around town in a home-made go-kart by their mother...)

And I can't help what drugs (and what ideas about women!!) were involved in the design of this one...:

I'll spare you the Foreigner album cover.

Sun, by Cat Power

This Cat Power album is fast becoming one of my repeat-play albums of this summer. It's got the right breeziness for intense heat. Manhatten feels especially cool.

I was worried that having lost touch with Cat Power, and not being keen on some latterday stuff, that I wouldn't like the album. In fact, hearing some of the leading material from this album on Youtube, I was disappointed, it felt pale and not all that melodic.

But seeing her Glastonbury performance this year (one of only about two or three televised acts worth my time - the rest wasn't even broadcast, eg Six By Seven, Robyn Hitchcock - and I got to pining for John Peel's wry and lovely voice as well, but that's another story...), turned me right around. I find an honesty and a kind of strength in her clear discomfort for playing live, no falsity or persona. Albeit, she did seem pretty stoned, and sadly kind of lost, but, that's Glastonbury for you, I couldn't blame her for being overwhelmed/high in the moment.

My immediate reaction to seeing her sing again after so long was fondness. When I was at university, I practically worshipped Chan Marshall: the only female poster on my (male-dominated) wall, and I wanted to play guitar like her, and I saw her live, loved her interview comments, wanted to be her, etc... There are very few females that have that effect on me, if I'm honest.

This album has two huge highlights in the opener, Cherokee, and Manhatten. I've got to admit that hearing these songs on the stereo, and not on a basic laptop, makes such a difference to my feelings for them, too. Obvious thing to say.. But sampling stuff online is often such a bad option for me if it wrongly mars my reactions, as is often the case.... I suppose it's not always down to quality, though, but the immediacy (instant) that the medium demands (though, conversely, with the recent, new Six by Seven material I was hooked from the off). This video for Manhatten is really cool and in good fun though - and maybe now I know the song and taken it to my heart, I enjoy it a whole lot more. I have to state how much I adore the electronic beats along to the piano riffs too:

Overall, it is Cat Power's honeyed voice, treacle thick and sensual that wins me over, and reminds me what I love about this artist.

A toast to Sun by Cat Power, then! Soundtrack to beautiful, laidback summer evenings. Now, to complete my Cat Power collection.

Albums of summers past #2

Had a real craving to hear this album when it was unbearably hot the other night, and I was cooking. There's something incredibly suited to the recent weather about this album. It's not so much that it reminds me of when I was younger and listening to this album (on C90 tape again - but I then owned it on CD), perfect summer times, or anything... Though I do recall the fun time I had when the Dandy Warhols came to my small town, the sensation that caused at school, and the amazing gig itself...

No, Dandy Warhols Come Down just has this incredibly cool air about it - both exuding from the band as they deliver it, and from the songs as they sound... There's a really nice groove to it, that makes you feel (or wish to be) stoned, and it's very American-cool sounding - and danceable - rock/pop, which I appreciate. It's such a 60s influenced album, too. A lot of the songs are good time, and there's summery pop bounding about. This is one of my albums of the summer at the moment, as is some of their first album.

Not wanting to mention The Dandys in the same breath purposely, but I was already thinking about and remembering what an ideal summer album this was for me a few years ago, so I'll just mention it anyway - and the music has a similar effect and groove and influences...

 

I guess it was more the Peppermint Wonderland singles collection by The Brian Jonestown Massacre that I dug this one perfect, happy summer some years ago. But then, there are two songs from here that were on constant repeat as well: Free & Easy, Take II, and The Ballad of Jim Jones. I guess it's the harmonica that makes it so summery and cool. The laidback, hippie, 60s air. I remember feeling so ecstatic this summer, strolls in west London parks, all this amazing, tuneful music soundtracking everything, feeling so spirited.

 

 

Underrated and wrongly slated, I feel. The farewell album from Mansun had a lot of moments. This reminds me of being on my year out, working weird shifts at a cinema, being practically nocturnal, and often coming home to listen to this and Marquee Moon by Television, as I drank restorative booze, so badly needed as my muscles ached so much from the long hours at the cinema. A strange time in my life, but how acoustic and melodic this album was in places was really nice - and, again, that word, sorry, but no other fits - breezy!

 

That same period of my life as the above, evenings as the sun set, and there was dreamy pink-yellow-purple light, were often soundtracked by this. Again, just so cool sounding - floaty, and ebbing on and on, winding guitars, hypnotic.

Albums from summers past

Breezy but hot summer has reminded me so much of youthful afternoons listening to Vauxhall and I. And how I seldom dig it out nowadays. I actually still only own it on the same cassette tape that I taped it from the library with, back then! Had to have a bit of  a dig around to locate it. On the flip-side are a bunch of classic/repeat Peel sessions, mix of stuff like New Order, Sleeper, Gene, The Cure, The Housemartins, oh and John Peel saying he'd need thousands of pounds to hear any more session tracks by The Farm...

The slew of six songs on the first half of this Morrissey album are absolutely, unadulterated perfection, for me. Now My Heart is Full, Hold onto Your Friends, and Why Don't You Find Out For Yourself, in especial. The opening line of the latter kept getting in my head with the weather, and made me need to hear it again. The rest of the album is good to excellent, but it's the first half that makes this album for me. Ah, so much yearning. The songs really take me back to a point in time, and, yep, I was often found indoors, supine, and writing letters to odd people in Luxembourg, and the like...

Another breezy sounding album from this sort of time, again borrowed from the library and stealthily recorded onto tape, and still needs to be replaced on CD, is this one:



Singing my heart out, dreamily, such a romantic, prettily melodic collection of songs...quiet, sometimes lovelorn, but assured vocals...emotive, poetic lyrics....really very literate and eye-opening to me as a teenager, I even made a homemade lyric booklet to fit inside the tape case - days before the internet! I copied them by hand often - though this time I must've used not even a computer as we hadn't one, but an electronic typewriter...The inter-vocal play with female and male is so nicely complementing...Dive for Your Memory so evocative of being on a cliff....reminds me of picnics by water, and cycling in the sun, writing letters to endless pen pals on my bed of an afternoon with the tape on...the harmonica part of Quiet Heart drifting out of the window, plaintively...

Streets of Your Town is the highlight of the Go-Betweens' 16 Lovers Lane, for me, really feel the cool breeze when I hear this song...

Still such a painfully underappreciated band, so many perfect songs, and I'm glad I could appreciate them at such a young age. This album is seamless for me, not a band song on it, one of my favourites.

 

More summer album posts coming...

Devendra Banhart, tame imposter....

What do you do when you realise you've spent three days listening to a disc that you were led to believe was the new Devendra Banhart album - but is, in fact, by Tame Impala? This album that says Tame Impala on it came in a Devendra Banhart sleeve, and was sealed with cellophane when I bought it... from HMV.

Does this mean someone out there has a Tame Impala sleeve, with a Devendra Banhart disc inside? And are they as confused as me? And do they want to do a swap, jigsaw puzzle style?

This has never happened to me before! I've been buying music from record shops for 20 years. I'd be intrigued to hear any similar tales... It goes to show how music can't always be central to life as I get older, that I didn't notice.

I really do dig this album. From the first listen, I was captured by the very different direction Devendra Banhart had chosen to take. Drums so high and pounding in the mix, electronic sounds, and a very big, fuzzy, hazy, echoing sound that I bet would sound incredible and even more echoing and astoundingly all-encompassing on certain drugs. It sounds so 60s and so Beatles-y, that I just cruised along, merrily accepting that this was Devendra Banhart. The music is very plausible, in its Beatles-like 60s way - he's a huge hippie. It's the voice that I kept questioning. It sounds exactly like John Lennon, especially on the first track. I just ended up assuming there was some sort of John Lennon machine and Devendra had channelled his voice through it. His own voice is much deeper, so this album has been jarring with me a bit and making me wonder, it being so much higher... like it was a different vocalist.

I didn't look at the label on the actual disc much, only the album sleeve, until today. So when I picked the CD up today, from the player, and inspected it absent-mindedly for the first time, I suddenly realised what was actually written on it was Tame Impala. For a split second, I thought it must be a misprint, I'd gotten so used to this album being the latest Devendra Banhart release...

But now I'm in the position where I can't locate any receipt, and I'm wondering: do I want to go in and ask for the Tame Impala sleeve, then wait till I can buy the Devendra Banhart album... Or go and demand my copy of the rightful Devendra Banhart album and let them sort it out with the distribution company... Or keep my wonky, unique musical artefact... No proof that it is the mishap that I say it is, though...

You don't get this fun and serendipity with downloading music, now, do you?

Six by Seven times nine!

Not only am I addicted to the new songs from Six By Seven's next album, over at Soundcloud, but I finally got round to fixing up the holes in my Six by Seven album collection (it's perfect, I've only doubled up with one album but plan on gifting it to somebody).

Nine albums for £5?! Courtesy of the band at their website.

It's a necessary parcel of noisy panacea that I was so gladdened to come home to. Really looking forward to hearing Chris Olley's solo work properly now too.

Did you know Chris Olley makes fuzz pedals?

Onwards to the new album, Love, Peace and Sympathy, hoping to track it down in an independent shop near me ASAP.

Machineries of Joy, by British Sea Power

The new British Sea Power album is worth getting on vinyl - because you get a free CD of the album inside too! All my BSP stuff is on CD bar two little one-off singles, so I was a bit unsure when I got to Banquet Records and found they had no copies of the CD left (more due to come), and I wasn't banking on the £14.99 cost. But I had my loyalty card with me, and that knocked the price down, which was good - got new record needles, and a recent album by Gravenhurst into the bargain.

I had listened to the pre-release 'streaming' of the album before it came out, as I knew I wouldn't be able to buy it up on day of release (as I was out of the country - missed the band's cruise and gig party, but I had much needed sunshine to soak up). I wasn't sure I would like the album. I wasn't expecting so many of my favourite songs from the demo EPS to not be included, and some of the choices suprised me.

But it is growing on me more and more, and seeing them play live recently cemented it all really. The title track is just great. The video with the bike ride, and the images they projected live add to things - they've gone all nice, slow and thoughtful and epic sounding.

Spring has Sprung is an appropriate sentiment of a song finally, and it is my favourite song on the album - possibly closely followed by What You Need the Most, which conjures ballroom lights a-twinkle, slow-dancing.

I need to have an evening listening to the 6 demo EPs in succession, and then hearing the resultant album. But taken in itself, it is a refreshing sound; no other bands like them. Against their previous material (and I can do this, as I've been with the band since the earliest days of 2001, followed their changes and ascent), it is still very much the sound of a band that are precious to me, yet it's different sounding for them, development; and I'm glad.

Here is my latest BSP scout's patch (this band have the very best in merchandise):



At the gig, I gave in to buying a new BSP mug too. It seems essential getting-out-bed inspiration. It has a bee design, and something magical happens when you pour hot water in. The bee slowly fades away, and you're met with 'BEE' 'GONE' - alluding to both their song of similar (punned) name, and to the ailing bee population. Care for the environment - that is what I like in a band. On sale, the band also had a t-shirt that read BIPOLAR - two polar bears side by side. Onstage during the encore, we were treated to the sight of an 8 foot polar bear suited person stomping about, clspping its great paws, causing mischief. Doesn't get much better than this!

Record shopping joy / Robyn Hitchcock heaven again

I'm on a post-record shop high. I've come back with original 80s vinyl albums, a recent-ish vinyl single, and a live CD album, plus various flyers and free music magazine publications that I otherwise would not come across - plus importantly, I feel much cheered up.

In the current times, I was half-wary that I might walk up London Road to find Collectors Records shutdown, but thank god it was still there. Some good chat with Keith the owner as usual. When he consults his Record Collector book to assert facts, it's kind of humbling and wonderful - because young people would just whip out their mobile phones and hit on the Wikipedia website. It's sad to think that actions like that might not live on many more years. But you cannot beat in-person knowledge that you also get in record shops, and the click of like-minds.

I'm afraid I can't boast an eclectic roster of purchases to dazzle you with, as the allure of the H section of vinyl led to surprise finds of original Robyn Hitchcock albums, and I was hooked as usual. It's funny that for a stretch of a couple of years I could not track any of his albums down, even on CD, but in the last year they seem to be like psychedelic painted buses. I hadn't intended to spend as much as I did, but I know that had I turned my back, they would be gone by my next visit. I'm well aware that all these songs were re-released digitally via his site, and I even own a run of three or four songs from the first of the tracks here - but damn, the vinyl sound, all the tracks I don't know (for it is a compilation and not a standard album), the splendid artwork, and the mad liner notes which I will later get a certain person to read out to me perfectly later....

The album cover in its vinyl-size glory bowled me over to prove irresistible too. Robyn Hitchcock offering me a bunch of radishes, how can I refuse? AKA, they don't make overwhelmingly imaginative pop stars like this no more:

I also took up Groovy Decoy, a revised version of (plus bonus tracks) Groovy Decay, the latter being one which I had been thinking about needing recently. The album art for Groovy Decoy isn't nearly as marvellous as the original Groovy Decay, and I need to hear it as it orignally was, so that shall have to be bought up at some point too, despite how its seen by author, and others.

Listening to the above now. Getting giddy about the next Robyn Hitchcock gig again - his 60th brithday celebrations.

There are countless ingenius song titles from Hitchcock. Favourite tonight is: Point it at Gran.

The other records I bought were Nighthawks at the Diner, a live album by by Tom Waits, which is jazzy, mellow but amusing so far. And I took a risk on a new release seven inch single, because I needed change for the train machine! Not a convincing excuse, but... I always try to buy even just a little something when I am near Banquet Records in Kingston, a fanzine, a single... This was by Teenagers in Tokyo, which sounds so Cure-like with its sweet pop keyboards and perfect bass, I love it, the b-side of Long Walk Home, mainly.

Robyn Hitchcock is yelling: Kevin! Supper's ready! now, so I've got to go....

www.collectorsrecordskingston.co.uk

Love From London

I absolutely love the image Robyn Hitchcock has painted for his new album, Love From London:

I like the joy of my perceived meanings behind it, and of course the skill of the artwork alone. On a personal level, it resonates/represents something to me as well. The t-shirt too:

In times when download vouchers are given to me as birthday presents, or I overhear people justifying their 'still' buying CDs as if it is absurd unheard-of behaviour, it's a fine feeling to fall in love with album artwork. I've written before about the wonder of bands like Joy Formidable who use the art of physical music artefacts to their advantage in selling records - selling one-off hand-painted/numbered Christmas singles, or specially wrapped live albums that come with one-off band t-shirts, or the absolute: selling a new release in limited quantities with broken bits of the singer Ritzy's smashed-up-on-stage guitar! And British Sea Power are the epitome of/experts in releases/design/merchandise, and it really adds to the feeling of uniqueness/romance about the band.

Needless to say, I have fervently rushed to order both albums by Hitchcock and BSP couple of months before release date - the latter direct from the band; former from the noble Yeproc Records. It's very rare that I take excited interest in the very release date of a new album nowadays, but this feels very much like an event, combined with Robyn's 60th birthday shindig gig set for the end of the month - as does the upcoming British Sea Power tour and album. It was luxury and reward to be able to spend the first bit of my wages on some things as wonderful and life-affirming as these. If I could, I'd travel the country a fair bit following both tours.

I love the many songs that Robyn Hitchcock has written about London, and how in recent years the timing and locations have had such poignancy to me, and make the very streets I tread reverberate with meaning, poetry, definition. I suppose spotting him about, or hearing of his frequenting/enjoying certain corners adds to enjoyment and love of these areas that perhaps haven't been celebrated so much, particularly by recent songwriters.

The new songs from Robyn have come right up and hugged me. A recent session on an American radio show was just perfect, and I'm looking forward to catching up on the Daytrotter stuff he did last Friday too.

And again and again and again, if I could be in a band with anyone of any mindset, it would be someone like Robyn Hitchcock - only there is no one like him.

Further thoughts on music buying/HMV

Here's a genuine overheard person on a mobile phone - the location was a little secondhand book shop:

'I'm in a book shop'
[pause]
'I'm old school - I still buy CDs!'

My heart sank. And I just felt the really strong urge that I am not of these times. It was someone not that much younger than me. Something like that makes me feel so sad - it's so odd and alien to me that buying any kind of physical music product can be seen as, what, kitsch? A stylistic choice? Or just plain old fashioned.

I enjoyed Stuart Braithwaite's addition to the great HMV debate, recently.

He has a good point about extremely low pricing making CDs seem disposable when once they were £15. I remember paying £15.99 for CD albums that weren't even new release, and I remember cassette albums in their last days in the album charts being £15.99 too, which is pretty shocking to look back on. The in between always seems fair to me - and a lot of independent record shops have got that right, eg new releases at anywhere between £8.99 and £12.99.

And the below is too true to:

'As a trusted brand, HMV could quite easily have used its position to establish digital music sales far earlier and far better than it did. Filling its shop floors with iPods was surely an act of cutting one’s own throat, and I had a discussion with someone working in Waterstones recently who felt the same way about its stores selling ­Kindles.'

It will be interesting to see what changes get made to the stock/store policies should a buyer take over HMV.

It's incredibly hard for me to comment or get my head around any potential for there to be a next generation who expect all their music free and therefore for music buying to end totally, as I don't know anyone that feels that way, and the most hardcore music fans I know all adore and use record shops in towns and cities - they also tend to see the urgent need to support bands direct, buying albums and t-shirts at gigs so the band get the money direct, and so on. The thought occurs that new music is so much more ubiquitous now than when I was a teenager, there is almost no escape, and TV shows and advertising in particular have gone indie soundtrack in a way that baffles me that would not baffle those growing up now - a song by Clinic in a Weetabix advert is still beyond comprehension to me! Music seems to mean much less in many ways, too - it is fashion, it is commodity more than ever.

I was recently excited to visit a new shop in the provincial town I grew up in, which specialised in band t-shirts (I'd harboured dreams about opening up a record shop there, selling albums and merchandise, as I didn't think just albums would be a success, in such a shopping-centre-driven place). Then I realised the horror that it was all in the name of fashion - it was all stuff that is worn more as a logo of cool/identity than fervent music fandom - a Ramones t-shirt now can sit alongside a Jack Wills one, it is just a style choice. I'm not the first music fan to find themselves seeing band t-shirts in trendy high street stores, and to see people wearing them in the street, and find myself wondering if they even own albums by this band. I once had a flatmate who worked for a major record company but whom owned about 20 CDs, and I once saw on her packing list for a festival trip - 'Rolling Stones tee'. There wasn't a Rolling Stones record in the house, and no other reference to them to be seen/heard from her either. And there is huge peril there that that's a big part of how music has come to seem disposable to people...

On a brighter note, the staff at HMV Curzon Cinema seemed positive about the cinema remaining functional, due to the part ownership by Curzon - which is such a relief. Had some drinks there and celebrated. Also, bought a few items in the actual HMV store.

I leave the mini free versions of this 'zine in there regularly, but I do wonder who is picking it up, and I do wonder if there are that many 'old school'(!) music fans out there that are bothered about/interested in such a thing as a printed music fanzine anymore. Unless it becomes fashionable via an article in the mainstream press and is generally seen as some hip current phenomenon, it does seem to be a niche/dying art for a perhaps soon-to-be-lost generation - and it makes me very reluctantly... twee.

Another of my CD racks has collapsed. I had to smile to see that the Chris Morris album landed face up and was looking up at me (from the stack of stuff that was balanced on top of the shelf). It's not really amusing though - I wish I knew a carpenter. I wish I knew carpentry! I seriously want to learn. I want to be able to build my own super-shelf. The age of flimsy, shitty flat-pack furniture. I can't even afford that at the moment.

 

Best thing I have turned into a CD shelf - a wooden vintage wine box that some fool was throwing away. I also rescued this huge white shelf with all different compartments to it that someone has left up for grabs in the street - it's perfectly sized for LPs, then DVDs underneath. I'm very John Peel about my music collection. One day I want a special room just for it. I'm also a geek for filing, and keeping things nice, neat, ordered. It actually fills me with huge lament that my collection has to lie strewn in an out of order mess, all chaotic and unloved, until I can sort out a better shelving arrangement. I did see a lovely handpainted wooden shelf in a junk shop in Greenwich - but I didn't dare attempt to wield it on any train.

 

Anyway, points for shouting out the albums you can recognise. More points for recommending affordable decent shelving. Even more points for volunteering your carpentry skills...

 

Currently listening to a handmade compilation tape that I bought for a few pence. And it turns out I like This Mortal Coil. Or at least, I like the song 16 Days. Also enjoying hearing the full version of Is This the Life by Cardiacs. You know, I had bought the single on 12 inch vinyl, from someone's front garden sale in Hampstead (bizarrely came across it one afternoon a few years ago), only I left it at someone's place and their cleaner has thrown it out - or is a secret fan, hmm.