Monthly Archives: April 2008

I’m still here…honest!

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What can I say, I go back to work, can’t post daily…and anyone would think I was giving up!

No, still here, still with a massive pile of CDs, emails and mp3s to review over the weekend, and I get Monday off, so expect more regular postings here.

Obviously the blog isn’t a job but it isn’t a part-time thing.

Thinking about this lead me to post this classic satirical track:

Television Personalities -‘Part-Time Punks.’ mp3

…and having done that, there had to be some more PUNK of the early eighties variety:

Conflict -‘Mighty and Superior.’ mp3

Anti-Nowhere League -‘Streets Of London.’ mp3 (Is Ralph MacTell’s reaction to this recorded?)

Anti-Pasti -‘No Government.’ mp3

See you very soon…XX

Gig review: Kills/These New Puritans

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Edinburgh Liquid Rooms, April 15 2008

These New Puritans are one of those names that I’ve heard of and heard bits of but nothing had prepared me for this. Very loud, no extremely noisy and excellent. My mate compares them to Squarepusher and Hard-Fi having a punch-up in a dustbin (thanks for letting me use that, Gordon!) with Primal Scream circa XTRMNTR and Peter Hook pitching in as well.It’s bass heavy and utterly wonderful. Music to lose yourself in. They have so much echo on the vocals that you cannot make out what they say. This does not matter one iota. the final track features the bass player helping out on drums while the singer ramblings sound ‘dubbed out’ over white noise. This band are something special.

We wait ages for the Kills but the DJ or whoever plays pretty much the entirety of It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back, and let’s face it, that’s an album you can never hear enough. This evening, as I wait for the Kills to come onstage is time to reflect: the first time I saw the Kills they were the support act to Primal Scream (Edinburgh Corn Exchange, December 1992) and one of the most amazing acts I’d ever seen. The debut LP Keep On Your Mean Side appeared six months later and did not disappoint. Two years later the band dropped No Wow. Not as acclaimed as their debut but by now the band were as likely to appear at fashion shows as scuzzy gigs. They played a good set at the Liquid Rooms that night, but at the time, the future Mrs. 17 Seconds and I were exhausted, slumped across the tables upstairs as we listened. And three years later, the band have released Midnight Boom. In the interceding years, Alison Mossheart has contributed vocals to Placebo’s fifth album, the band have recorded a version of ‘I Call It Art’ by Serge Gainsbourg…oh yes, and Jamie has a celebrity girlfriend.

But enough of that. Tonight The Kills deliver on every promise and hint of greatness and slay the audience (given half a chance, I bet they’d actually do that, too). They tear into Midnight Boom’s opener ‘U.R.A. Fever’ and then into ‘Pull A U.’ If you’d ever forgotten why you liked the Kills then a show like this slaps you around the face and reminds you exactly why, dammit. ‘No Wow’ bristles with what I can only describe as gorgeous tension, while ‘Kissy Kissy’ is as bluesy as ever. As for ‘Fried My Little Brains’ and ‘The Good Ones…’ these guys are intense, in the best possible way. Hell, their encore ‘Love Is A Deserter’ manages to incorporate what sounds like the riff to ‘Funky Town’ and just explodes.

To watch the Kills on stage as Alison and Jamie do things that go beyond description with their instruments and sound, still just the two of them and a drum machine, is to understand that rock’n’roll lives, pouts and sneers still. They may sing that they’re tired of being cheap and cheerful, and really, they are so much more.

Ignore these bands at your peril.

*****

These New Puritans -‘Navigate, Navigate.’ mp3

Kills -‘Cheap and Cheerful.’ mp3

The Kills’ official website/The Kills’ MySpace

These New Puritans official website/These New Puritans Myspace

Gig review: Radar Bros.

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Edinburgh Cabaret Voltaire, April 14 2008

‘Hello, everyone, we’re the smokey mountain boys,’ quips Jim Putnam, as the Radar Bros. launch into ‘Shoveling Sons.’ (yes, only one ‘l’)

Wow. Of all the tunes I really wanted to hear, this was the one -and they’ve started with it! The Radar Bros. are in the UK promoting their new album Auditorium. Though they are based in LA, given that their records are released in the UK via seminal scottish indie label Chemikal underground, it’s appropriate that they should be here in Scotland.

Unfortunately, the audience at the gig is woefully fin, and whilst Cabaret Voltaire isn’t one of Scotland or even Edinburgh’s bigger venues, it’s a real shame that such a great live act as this is playing to such a thin audience.

But, no matter. Because the hour long set is an absolute treat for those of us who are there. For those who’ve never heard Radar Bros, their sound, without wishing to pigeonhole, would be filed under Americana, rather than, say, Indie or Country & Western. Jim’s voice is unlike Jason Lyttle’s but the music is reminsicent of Grandaddy minus the Psychedelic element or Pavement circa Terror Twilight.

By the third song, ‘Rock Of the Lake’ I’m easing into a gentle mellow state, completely due to the music. Lake’s obviously feature a fair bit in their titles, as they also play ‘Lake Life’ from the new album. Having never seen them live before, but been aware of them since they were first released in the UK, I hugely rate this show.

Given their back catalogue, technically they could have played for longer, but the hour they do give us sends us out into the Monday night air refreshed and cheered. Come back soon, guys.

***1/2

Radar Bros. -‘Shovelling Sons.’ mp3

Radar Bros. -‘Lake Life.’ mp3

Radar Bros. website/Radar Bros. myspace

Joolz Denby – poet, artist, legend

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Her Myspace profile describes her as a cultural revolutionary.

It’s a pretty accurate description. I guess one of Ed 17 Seconds’ alltime heroes doesn’t really fit the bill, but it’s true.

She emerged in the eighties, described as a ‘punk poetess’ though there was more to her than that. She hails from Bradford, a city she’s obviously fiercely proud of and is a cultural ambassador for the city. She’s an artist, who worked and continues to work closely with New Model Army, designing many of their sleeves. She wrote thought-provoking poetry and prose, sometimes sad, quite often angry, yet frequently funny and always utterly brilliant (anyone who has a copy of her book Mad, Bad And Dangerous To Know should get in touch). In the last decade she has also published four novels that have to be read: Stone Baby, Corazon, Billie Morgan and Borrowed Light, all of which have to be read and re-read.

I finally met her in early 2000 at a New Model Army gig (she’s the long-term partner of singer Justin Sullivan, aka Slade The Leveller) and nervously trotted up to say. I needn’t have worried; she was very approachable, and I later met on three separate occaions, Glastonbury, the Edinburgh Book Festival and at a solo Justin Sullivan gig in Edinburgh. In 2000 when I was writing my Masters dissertation, I corresponded with her, and she gave me some thought-provoking correspondence via email.

She also made some excellent records, mostly in the eighties, and this is one I’d love 17 seconds readers to hear:

Joolz -‘Mad, Bad and dangerous To Know.’ mp3

If you like it, please buy it!

Joolz Denby’s official website

The online shop. You must, you really must!

I know i shouldn’t…but I do!

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Back in 2005, a friend of mine, who’s accompanied me to many gigs and made many recommendations texted me: ‘You’re not going to believe this…but the new Stereophonics’ single is really good!’

‘You’re right,’ I responded. ‘I’m not.’

It wasn’t always this way. I’d loved the Stereophonics around the release of their first album Word Gets Around, and had seen them supporting James in late 1998, around the time of the ‘Bartender and the Thief’ single (within a matter of months it might have seemed surprising it was that way round). The early songs, particularly the sad ‘Local Boy In The Photograph’ about a suicide was great.

Then somehow, from second album Performance and Cocktails onwards, as Sterophonics started to sell a lot of records, I found their music increasingly dreary. By the time of their third album Just Enough Education To Perform I’d started saying I hated them. Like Travis, I didn’t hate them for becoming successful, I’d gone off them because they were no longer any good, and it was bands like them that were making ‘indie’ seem synonymous with dull, trad rock, rather than out of the mainstream innovation.

So when ‘Dakota’ got to no.1 in 2005, it was a bolt from the blue. I can’t say that I’ve started buying their records again, nor am I likely to, but this is a great song. Posted here with one from when I really liked ’em.

Stereophonics -‘Local Boy In The Photograph.’ mp3

Stereophonics -‘Dakota.’ mp3

Album Review: James

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James -‘Hey Ma’ (Fontana)

Blimey. Having seen James back in action at Glasgow’s Academy, I knew they were in fine form live. So I was looking forward to hearing this album. Having played it six times since it arrived less than forty-eight hours ago, I’m finally sitting down to write the review.

First of all, the lineup that recorded the legendary Gold Mother album – probably James’ high point creatively so far, is back on this album.Tim Booth, Jim Glennie, Larry Gott, Saul Davies, Mark Hunter and Dave Baynton-Power are back with trumpeter Andy Diagram whose presence is all over this album in the most glorious way possible. Rather like Radiohead would find a couple of years’ later with ‘Creep,’ James’ biggest hit single ‘Sit Down’in 1991 became an albatross around the band’s collective neck and they refused to play it live for a time. But they produced many fine singles (‘She’s a Star’) and albums (Laid, Millionnaires) afterwards. Like U2, James went on to work with Brian Eno producing them, who helped them to produce genuinely brilliant atmospheric tracks ‘uplifting songs about insecurity, disaffection and mental illness.’ They split in 2001, but solo albums and an appearance by lead singer Tim Booth in 2006’s the Manchester Passion later, here they are.

And what an album. Over half a dozen albums -couldn’t tear myself away -I’ve fallen in love, head over heels with this album. Over the course of eleven songs, from opener ‘Bubbles’ to closer ‘I Wanna Go Home’ the album never lets up for a second. Many artists of both songs can’t write convincingly about their children (and Lennon & McCartney weren’t infallible here either), but Bubbles manages to do that. Title track ‘Hey Ma’ with it’s jaunty ‘Hey ma the boys in body bags’ is jaunty and uplifting – James were always quite political, and then as now you don’t have to look below the surface. Alas, it’s probably too political to be a single (by which I mean Radio won’t play it, and the record company wouldn’t support them, rather than that singles shouldn’t be political).

Approximately 45 minutes long, the album never dips, and not a single track feels like filler. The lyrics are sad at times, but the Booth humour is back too ‘My mum says I look like Yul Brynner – too old for Hamlet too young for Lear* on Whiteboy.

Was I swept away? No, I’ve played it three times today already, made a friend listen to it too, and he agrees. James are back -and how.

*****

Preview the album here at James’ official website

Make friends at their MySpace

* In the unlikely event you don’t know what this refers to, may I suggest you read more

Probably the most unnerving single ever made

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Music in polls can be a funny thing. Leaving aside the whole issue of bias, it’s weird what comes up. In a poll for the Guardian, this song came third, perhaps predictably behind Suicide’s ‘Frankie Teardrop’. In 1982 it was no.8 in the NME Writer’s Top 50 singles of the year, beating New Order’s Temptation, Dexy’s Midnight Runners ‘Come On Eileen’ and even ‘My Baby Just Cares For me’ by Nina Simone.

In fact, most people would feel that the definition of a great single was one that was designed to be played again and again. And I would agree.

Except here.

This single is pretty much the exception that proves the rule. Back in 1982, after the Specials had split, with the Fun Boy Three being formed. Jerry Dammers had formed the Special AKA who a couple of years later would make one of the greatest protest songs ever, in ‘Free Nelson Mandela.’ This was the first post-Specials single, and managed to make no.35 in the charts, which considering it’s content was no mean feat.

Featuring Rhoda Dakar, previously of The Bodysnatchers, it’s a track that is harrowing in the extreme. An excellent article here at Sweeping the nation sums it up best.

The song is spoken, not sung, and certainly not rapped. It deals with the story of a woman, with appalling low self-esteem who’s picked up by a guy in clothes shop, takes her clubbing and then attacks her.

In Gary Mulholland’s superlative This Is Uncool: the 500 Best Singles Since Punk and Disco, he writes that he bought it, played it once, freaked out and played it once again when writing the book. He mentions that this song about rape – which horrifies the listener even more than Tori Amos’ autobiographical ‘Me and a gun’ – had been released into an environment where a judge had accused a rape victim of ‘contributory negligence’ (sic) for hitch-hiking alone before an attack. No, your honour, nothing but nothing justifies this.

I post this, certainly not to shock, but because I was reminded of it whilst reading a post on the Specials over at Teenage Kicks and, even more importantly because everyone should hear this at least once. I’ll understand, though, if you feel you can’t face it, or feel you want to delete it afterwards.

Rhoda with the Special AKA -‘The Boiler.’ mp3

Album Review: Tapes ‘n’ Tapes

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Tapes ‘n’ Tapes -‘Walk It Off’ (XL)

Oh, I hate it when this happens. In 2006 the blogosphere was abuzz with the news of Tapes ‘n’ Tapes debut album The Loon. It was arguably one of the most blog-indebted records since Arcade Fire’s Funeral. It was clearly out of the ‘indie leftfield’ indebted as it was to the Pixies and Pavement and yet had a distinctive flavour of it’s own.

So, two years later, the follow-up Walk It Off arrives. And I’m sad to report that, two whole listens and a few tracks I’ve tried to hone in on to change my mind…this is somehow just a deeply average record. It’s by no means a bad record, but somehow, much as I want to, I’m not falling in love with it like I want to. Tracks like ‘La Ruse’ and ‘George Michael’ are fine in their own way, but a couple of years ago it seemed like these guys could appear and have a major impact. Much to my disappointment, I cannot see this album winning Tapes ‘n’ Tapes any more fans. Yeah it’s got a few nice quirks, like the Pixies meets Pavement single ‘Hang Them All’ but this isn’t an anthem, just a nice enough single. The standout track ‘Dirty Dirty’ with it’s with refrain of ‘Where did all the money go?’ is redeems the album a little, but sufficiently for this reviewer.

Maybe after a few more listens my mind will change, but it’s not happening now.

**1/2

Daytrotter had Tapes ‘n’ Tapes in recently and they recorded four songs. check it out here

For earlier Tapes n’ Tapes music go here at their website

Presenting…We Do Not Negotiate With Terrorists

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The snappily named We Do Not Negotiate With Terrorists cite their main interest as Withnail and I, 17 Seconds’ favourite ever film (no, I really never tire of mentioning this), and also list Echo & The Bunnymen, The Specials, Gang Of Four, The Charlatans, The Smiths, The Clash, The Fall, Blondie, The Cure, Dexies Midnight Runners as amongst their other indfluences. Great tunes, snappy image, bags of just the right sort of attitude…Really, what is not to love about this Manchester band? Currently unsigned…but I can’t believe it will stay that way for long.

Hell, if I had my own radio show, I’d play ’em. Sigh…

We Do Not Negotiate With Terrorists – ‘Turn and Run.’ mp3

We Do Not Negotiate With Terrorists -‘Wrong Eyes.’ mp3

It’s dog eat dog eat dog …

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Stayed at school ’til six this evening, marking exam papers, armed with only my iPod and endless mugs of black coffee. These two tracks came on the iPod…bliss.

Adam and the Ants -‘Cartrouble.’ mp3

Adam and the Ants -‘Never Trust A Man (With Egg On His Face).’ mp3

There’s so much more to the band and the man than just the big hits…