Thank you for these, John

john-peel-grave

Seven years since John Peel died (as I pointed out yesterday).

A handful of tracks from acts that he championed. If you like them, do go and investigate further.

His favourite band…my favourite place to live:

The Fall -‘Edinburgh Man.’ mp3

There was stuff before Punk, y’know…

Led Zeppelin -‘Whole Lotta Love.’ mp3

He knew that there was stuff further than just England…

Jesus and Mary Chain -‘Upside Down.’ mp3

Stuff from further afield than Europe and America:

Bhundu Boys -‘My Foolish Heart.’ mp3

Bob Marley & The Wailers -‘Waiting In Vain.’ mp3

Some stuff shoulda had a much wider profile:

Matching Mole -‘O Caroline.’ mp3

Some utter classics:

The Smiths -‘There Is A Light That Never Goes Out.’ mp3

…later covered in radical style:

Schneider TM -‘The Light 3000.’ mp3

He certainly knew that it wasn’t just about guitars:

Aphex Twin-‘Girl/Boy Song.’ mp3

…and I don’t think anymore needs to be said about this, other than…ENJOY:

The Undertones -‘Teenage Kicks.’ mp3

What was it about Peel? This was my contribution to Fresh Air’s special:

To me, John Peel was the radio DJ that all others were measured by. His sense of humour and passion for music – ‘I just want to hear something I haven’t heard before’ was infectious. Right up to the day he died, here was a man who cared about music.

The list of bands he championed from early beginnings who went on to have a massive impact – even if only for a while – is very long but would include artists as diverse as Led Zeppelin, Kelis, Captain Beefheart, Frankie Goes to Hollywood, Nirvana, The Cure, White Stripes, Happy Mondays, Queen, PJ Harvey, David Bowie…He took flack from the far right for playing reggae. He played the Sex Pistols when no-one else would touch them. He championed styles from Prog-rock to Dubstep to ‘world’; happy hardcore to folk to death metal. As a teenager I would listen under the bedclothes trying to stay awake until the end of the show (in 1992, if you missed a radio show, that was it, there was nowhere to go to listen again, unless someone happened to have taped it).

I’ve only done a handful of shows on the radio but when people say to me that they can hear the Peel influence, I’m flattered. It is not over-exaggerating to say that without John Peel the musical landscape of the last forty years in the UK (and indeed further afield) would have been vastly different were it not for him, and all the poorer for it.
I missed the night he read my name out on there, but fortunately by this stage the internet had come along).

If I’d ever been in a band that had got beyond the gigging and demo stage, given the choice between a Peel session and Top Of The Pops I would have chosen the Peel session.

Would I have been begging him to play 17 Seconds Records’ acts on his show? D’uh!

Thank crunchie it’s Friday

crunchie

…does there have to be a reason? Just fancied posting some great covers, frankly.

New Age Steppers -‘Fade Away (Junior Byles cover).’ mp3

Schneider TM -‘The Light 3000 (The Smiths cover).’ mp3

Teenage Fanclub -‘Nothing To be Done (Pastels cover).’ mp3

X-Lion Tamer -‘Starsign (Teenage Fanclub cover).’ mp3

Biffy Clyro-‘Umbrella (Rihanna cover).’ mp3

Cud -‘You Sexy Thing (Hot Chocolate cover).’ mp3

Voxtrot -‘Love Vigilantes (New Order cover).’mp3

Kaiser Chiefs -‘Golden Skans (Klaxons cover).’ mp3

The Streets -‘Your Song (Elton John cover).’ mp3

My Bloody Valentine -‘We Have All The Time In the World (Louis Armstrong cover).’ mp3

Enjoy!

x

Some more covers for Friday

Just as it says on that there tin, folks… have posted many of these before, but what the heck.

Back from holidays soon, so expect more new stuff here.

Tom McShane -‘That’s All There Is (Nina Simone cover).’ mp3

Comrade Down -‘American Trilogy (Delgados cover).’ mp3

Cat Power -‘Wonderwall (Oasis cover; John Peel session.’ mp3

Cat Power -‘We Dance (Pavement cover).’ mp3

Jesus and Mary Chain -‘Vegetable Man (Syd Barrett cover).’ mp3

Teenage Fanclub -‘Nothing To Be Done (Pastels cover).’ mp3

Sia -‘I Go To Sleep (The Kinks cover).’ mp3

Schneider TM -‘The Light 3000 (Smiths cover -originally There Is A Light That Never Goes Out.’ mp3

Propaganda -‘Sorry For Laughing (Josef K cover).’ mp3

Grace Jones -‘La Vie En Rose (Edith Piaf cover).’ mp3

Some Covers For Sunday I

Well, yesterday’s covers post seemed to have been a hit and I thought I’d repost some tracks I’d been asked to, as well as a few I haven’t posted here before.

Belle and Sebastian -‘Final Day (Young Marble Giants).’ mp3

Jeff Buckley -‘Hallelujah (Leonard Cohen cover).’ mp3

Breeders -‘Happiness Is A Warm Gun (The Beatles cover).’ mp3

CSS – ‘One Way Or Another (Blondie cover).’ mp3

Pop Will Eat Itself -‘Games Without Frontiers (Peter Gabriel cover).’ mp3

Sia -‘I Go To Sleep (The Kinks cover).’ mp3

Raincoats -‘Lola (The Kinks cover).’ mp3

Slits -‘I Heard It Through The Grapevine (Marvin Gaye cover).’

Schneider TM -‘The Light 3000 (cover of The Smiths There Is A Light That Never Goes Out).’ mp3

This Mortal Coil -‘Song To the Siren (Tim Buckley cover).’ mp3

For what it’s worth, I genuinely hold The Slits, Schneider TM, The Raincoats, This Mortal Coil and Jeff Buckley to be amongst the finest cover versions ever done. In the unlikely event of any list of best ever cover versions NOT including these, I think I would have to have a word. They reinvent the songs concerned, and that’s what a cover version should do.

Some Covers For Friday Part III

Hey, it’s Friday, it’s been a good week, and I’m in the mood for sharing so here are some fantastic covers for you all.

First up, I heard Camera Obscura doing this live earlier this year, and it blew me away. They really DO make this their own song.

Camera Obscura -‘Super Trooper (Abba cover).’ mp3

Electric Light Orchestra are one of those bands that seem to be considered beyond naff, and yet…there’s something quite nice about their songs in small doses. Or in this case, in the hands of the much-missed Delgados (RIP).

The Delgados -‘Mr. Blue Sky (ELO cover).’ mp3

I know very little about this cover, exvcept that The archies were a TV show before I was born, and this was no.1 back in about 1969 -but it’s kinda cool, and I’d love to know where I can hear Mary Lou Lord’s cover of the Bevis Frond’s Lights Are Changing, too.

Mary Lou Lord -‘Sugar Sugar [from the Archies].’ mp3

You get to hear a lot of music when you write a blog. You also get the chance to hear a lot of stuff that you’ve been searching for for ages. These two songs were things I had put out pleas for-and ended up in my inbox extremely quickly. Thanks. These were originally recorded for an album for Northern Ireland called ‘Peace Together’ when the province was a lot more troubled. I love the Peter Gabriel original and also really like Pop Will Eat Itself’s take on it (Gabriel’s stuff with Genesis was mince though). While I quite like a lot of the Police’s stuff (though their solo stuff leaves much to be desired in a certain case, Mr. Sumner) I was never a big fan of this song, until I heard Therapy? do it.

Pop Will Eat Itself -‘Games Without Frontiers (Peter Gabriel cover).’ mp3

Therapy? -‘Invisible Sun (The Police cover).’ mp3

There are some great Arcade Fire covers dowing the rounds, I posted their version of Guns Of Brixton earlier this year. This is their take on Bowie’s Five Years.

Arcade Fire -‘Five Years (David Bowie cover).’ mp3

Morrissey was quite passionate about many bands over the years, and famously covered Suede’s early b-side ‘My Insatiable One’ (again, if you know where I can get hold of this, please get in touch) before most people had even heard of Suede. He also bigged up James years before they broke big (although it’s long been rumoured that ‘We Hate It When Our Friends Become Successful’ was a dig at them). This song -the b-sde to his ‘Pregnant For The Last Time’ single -was a cover of a Bradford song.

Morrissey -‘Skin Storm (Bradford cover).’ mp3

Speaking of seeking out covers…I’d made a plea for this earlier this week and got this, plus another Tori cover into the bargain..

Tori Amos -‘Smells Like Teen Spirit (Nirvana cover).’ mp3

Tori Amos -‘Happpiness Is A Warm Gun (The Beatles cover).’ mp3

Finally. This song (and if I really, really need to spell it out it’s ‘There Is A Light That Never Goes Out’) is possibly my very favourite cover version ever. I’ve no idea what Morrissey -or indeed any of The Smiths think of it – but it’s fab in my eyes (or should that be ears?)

Schneider TM -‘The Light 3000.’ mp3

As always, if you like what you hear, please go and seek it out (it should go without saying that I do not hold the copyright and these are here for sampling only) by supporting the artists involved, preferably through your local record shop!

Monday Monday

Hi, just a brief, brief post.

I survived my first day back at school, and I’m okay…but very tired.

Here are two tracks I love, which I know I have posted in the past, but they sense of sadness is something I connect with, right now, I guess.

Sweet Dreams.

Low -‘Monkey.’ mp3

from the album The Great Destroyer

Schneider TM -‘The Light 3000.’ mp3

Can be found on Rough Trade Shops electronic 01 compilation

The 100th post

(when I started writing the blog, I hadn’t got my cats. this is them, several months ago)

Well, and here we are! This is the 100th post I have done on the blog. Over the course of seven months, my interest in music, along with comments on teaching and hitting thirty have given me something to work on. Whilst I still dream of having as many readers as some of the other blogs, the feedback I have received has been flattering, and if I had as little rubbish to deal with at school as I do here, life would be easier!!

Thanks to my long-suffering girlfriend, and my family for their feedback, and friends and readers (of course, these are not necessarily mutually exclusive) who have helped this come along. I have learned more about computers along the way, and there’s probably fewer rants about it all now…

What I’ve done this time is just to pick ten great tracks, no theme, just stuff I love, and really hope you do too. As ever, if you like’em, do go and buy them.

Here’s to the next one hundred posts. Enjoy the music.