Hot Lunch: 2008

Monday, August 25, 2008

Provisional Picnic timetable?

A typed Electric Picnic timetable which purports to be the official one has been leaked.

It's clash city as far as I can see for quite a number of acts I was hoping to catch and there's a few mystifying times/stages too. Yet again, the Main Stage will be deserted for most of the festival, particularly on Sunday which is just one old cripple and heritage act after another. The most glaring omission from the Main Stage on Sunday has to be Christy Moore who is playing the noisy and boisterous Crawdaddy stage on the Friday evening. Stange choice that. Sunday is probably the weakest of the three days, thanks in no small part to the atrocious decision to book the Sex Pistols. The tent will be heaving for MBV no doubt, as it will for Underworld on the Saturday, the set I'm most looking forward to all weekend.

Friday night has plenty to offer as does Saturday evening. Wonder who the 'mystery guest' on Sunday night will be? As you can see the time after MBV has been left blank, unless of course they're planning an hour long wall of feedback during "You Made Me Realise" instead of the customary half hour.

Hot Lunch festival site report: A friend of Hot Lunch was on site in Stradbally this morning putting up a mast, and reports that the Green 'Oscar Wilde' campsite and dance area is probably the wettest/swampiest part of the site. His exact words were "it's a disaster waiting to happen". The yellow 'Hitler' campsite is also set to be a bit soft but he said the rest of the site is holding up pretty well with just a few areas under water.

Saturday, August 23, 2008

Johnny Cash at Glastonbury

"Hello, I'm Johnny Cash."

And with that famous introduction, uttered from the centre of the Pyramid Stage at Glastonbury on Sunday June 26th 1994, Johnny Cash won himself around 60,000 new fans and invented the Sunday afternoon 'living legend' slot at the festival. It helped that he followed his iconic introduction with a decent set, and his Glastonbury show has gone down in history, with even the man in black himself rating it as one of his own own personal favourites. Christ, the Garda helicopter is flying around outside, the knackers must be at it again. One would imagine the Olympics would have quietened them down. However, for me the Glastonbury show is typical of the stodgy ground Cash had mithered himself in for decades. I saw him in Dublin at the turn of the decade and whilst good fun, it was hardly the sort of show to cement itself in ones list of favorite gigs. It was so old hat that he even had TR Dallas supporting him that night!

Anyway, the Glastonbury show did mark a pivitol moment in the career of The Man in Black as it was this year when he released 'American Recordings', the first in is savage series of albums with Rick Rubin. Some tracks from it appear in this set, marking the transition. The album (and subsequent sequels) was perhaps the greatest reinvention of his career but yet, like the inventions of the Man in White, Joe Dolan, all he changed was the music. He still dressed the same, sounded the same and looked the same. But what a look!

The show is not fully captured on this disc, as this is a radio broadcast. The full concert can be found if you look hard enough and no doubt you'll end up on some Russian site full of fucking pop ups.

http://rapidshare.com/files/121875607/Johnny_Cash_-_Glastonbury_Festival_-_June_26__1994.rar
and http://u-oos5vofga.urlcash.net/

Tracklist: - Folsom Prison Blues- Sunday Morning Coming Down- Cristopher Song- Ring of Fire- I guess thing happen that way- the Beast in Me- Let the Train blow the Whistle - Big River- A Boy Named Sue

The wah-wah psychedelic blues of Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf

Two of the most revered but hardest to find blues albums of all-time are a pair of discs released at the tail-end of the 1960s – Howlin’ Wolf’s “This is Howlin' Wolf's New Album” and Muddy Water’s “Electric Mud”. They are perhaps the best (and the only survivors) of the Psychedelic Blues era when bluesmen reluctantly embraced what the kids were getting high to and played a hybrid blues that would scare anyone. As a child, these were two curious beasts at the back of my dad’s record collection, and they equally terrified and enthralled me. Sadly, they were part of a mass clear-out in the 1980s of which I’ll go into again at some stage so when I got to read about them as a teenager, and their importance, they had disappeared. However, on a trawl through another website where I was, er, getting the lend of a couple of Isaac Hayes albums and James Brown’s long-lost “Hell” album, I found them. But the links were dead. So I asked the webmaster if he wouldn’t mind uploading them again and he did, just for me. I owe him lunch, which I’ll buy him when I’m in America next month. Anyway, it was like meeting two childhood friends, and, for a couple of weeks, here they are for you dear readers (Hi Johnny, Simon and Ken!)

The albums were released by Cadet Concept, a short-lived but influential record label founded by Marshall Chess, the son of Leonard Chess of Chess Records.

Somehow, Chess convinced both bluesmen to deviate from their pure blues roots and embrace the then hip sounds of psychedelic electric guitar rock.

"Electric Mud" is one of most original blues albums there is. When this album was recorded in 68, Waters' career was in a slump and noting how the likes of Led Zeppelin and the Rolling Stones were making a mint out of “re-interpreting” old blues classics including some of his. Marshall Chess thought it best to seek out a new audience for Muddy and Howlin’ (and probably a few others too) if the kids were getting down to their stuff, albeit reimagined and ripped off. Both men were elder statesman who couldn't even sell to their own community but were still well known so over a hot lunch he convinced them to embrace a new sound.

“Electric Mud” is a wah-wah pedal and fuzz box friendly feast for the ears. The basic instrumentation on it includes a heavily distorted guitar (often with the wah-wah up to eleven), fuzz-tone electric bass, saxophone, synthesizer, and drums. This is quite a stretch from the trademark Muddy Waters sound! Five of the eight songs on 'Electric Mud' were Muddy Waters back catalogue staples, songs he had sung thousands, of times. A little hesitantly, he sang them as he always had. His accompaniment, however, was very much of the moment, and dopers of the world could united with new renditions of songs like "I Just Want To Make Love To You," "I'm Your Hoochie Coochie Man," and "Mannish Boy," in a hard, psychedelic rock style. It's a career-best recording of "Mannish Boy", and may be familiar to some as it appeared on an Uncut CD a while back. He even tries a Rolling Stones cover - “Let's Spend The Night Together." The vocals are one of the strong selling points of this album, and Muddy Waters is in great voice and some of his writing on it gets an A+ from me.

The record was a big hit, popular with both, er, communities and with all types of music lovers, including my dad.

"Electric Mud" was followed up with an attempt at relaunching the career of Howlin’ Wolf.

Wolf's opinion of the resulting record was emblazoned on the cover in bold letters- “This Is Howlin Wolf's New Album. He Doesn't Like It. He Didn't Like His Electric Guitar At First Either.”
In fact, he fucking hated it but it’s a class album and well worth downloading or buying if you ever see it in a shop. It’s worth ten fortunes though so the possibilities of that are impossible.

For the album, Marshall Chess brought in the same band that was used in the “Electric Mud” sessions: Pete Cosey and Phil Upchurch- guitars, Louis Satterfield on bass and Morris Jennings on drums to create the psychedelic blues-funk- rock-n-roll fusion that was becoming popular at the time.The album is funky with a tight rhythm section making Wolf's loose bluesy vocals pierce through even more. On Smokestack Lightning, a song he had probably performed a million times in its original raw form, a flute crops up to add some jazz fusion touches before the song trips off into a wah-wah wonderland. The rest of the album is just as funky and gritty.

If you don’t like big stoned wah-wah guitars and widdly-widdly-wee solos and funky drumming (as well as the odd glass-breaking howl) avoid both, but if you like a new twist on the blues, get these impossible to find (both albums have long since disappeared) albums while you can, particularly "Electric Mud".

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For your aural pleasure:

MUDDY WATERS _ ELECTRIC MUD

01. I Just Want To Make Love To You 02. I'm Your Hoochie Coochie Man 03. Let's Spend The Night Together 04. She's Alright 05. Mannish Boy 06. Herbert Harper's Free Press News 07. Tom Cat 08. The Same Thin

Cut n paste either of the following links into a new window but BEWARE, they are “sponsored” links and if an ad doesn’t appear (skip it) the first page that will come up is a holding page full of porn; When it opens click on the line that says ‘if your link has not appeared here in ten seconds’ or words to that effect as quick as you can and the download will give you numerous options such as Rapidshare, Megaupload etc.

http://u-sp2mmojef.urlcash.net/ or http://u-ip2mmpxl2.urlcash.net/

HOWLIN’ WOLF – THIS IS....

01. Spoonful 3:48 02. Tail Dragger 4:20 03. Smokestack Lightning 5:48 04. Moanin' at Midnight 3:13 05. Built for Comfort 5:17 06. The Red Rooster 3:48 07. Evil 4:06 08. Down in the Bottom 2:43 09. Three Hundred Pounds of Joy 2:34 10. Back Door Man 6:17

Cut n paste either of the following links into a new window but BEWARE, they are “sponsored” links and if an ad doesn’t appear (skip it) the first page that will come up is a holding page full of porn; When it opens click on the line that says ‘if your link has not appeared here in ten seconds’ or words to that effect as quick as you can and the download will give you numerous options such as Rapidshare, Megaupload etc.

http://u-6p2m85e5b.urlcash.net/ or http://u-vp2m86iat.urlcash.net/

Thanks to The Roadhouse.

Saturday, August 16, 2008

Gunnsunrosus go for broke

Axl Rose toasts his new Wall-Mart deal. "Screw you record store owners of America!"

Back in the late 1980’s and up to point when I realised that they were shite all along in the summer of 1992, if someone told me they had nine fresh tracks from an unreleased Guns ‘N’ Roses album, I’d have painted their house, killed their mother and raped their sheep to get my hands on them.

Earlier this year, after a widely publicised “leak”, nine Guns and Roses (or ‘Gunnsunrosus’ as they are referred to here in the midlands) tracks from their 14-years-in-the-making album "Chinese Democracy" appeared all over the internet. Anyone with even the slightest illegal download tracking skills could have found them – they were everywhere. And there was plenty of chatter that Gunnsunrosus were back! Back! Back! I had no interest in them; really and truly none at all. The world and its mother has spent over a decade reading about the tedious creation of this Axl solo disc, and even 14 years of rumour couldn’t sum up the “eagerly awaited” excitement in me. At one stage, as a smelly black tay-short wearing lad, I loved Axl and the boys but my G n’ R fixation only lasted until the bus home from Slane on May 16th 1992. They were shite that day and probably every other day. Utter, total shite. It was a gig I didn’t have to fight too long to forget about.

In fact, now that I think of it, all I remember from that day is an early morning naggin of vodka on the bus to Slane, My Little Funhouse being shit, another naggin of vodka, Faith No More being savage, the crowd throwing paper cups in the air for hours and hours and hours and hours and hours until Gunnsunrosus finally took the stage (in fact the wait was so long that a friend took up smoking such was his boredom - the poor fucker still smokes and personally blames Axl. I think I got sunstroke, and to add insult to injury I sobered up as Axl and that raggle-taggle bunch – except Matt Sorum, he was too clean – finally took the stage about 4 hours after Faith No More finished ). Of the Gunnsunrosus show itself all I can remember is the mind-numbing wankology of it all – solo after solo after solo, extended “Use Your Illusion” bombast after bombast and sweet fuck all from their one and only good album, “Appetite for Destruction”. The best song of the night was a short Axl-on-the-piano cover of Black Sabbath’s “It’s Alright” (the standout track 1976’s “Technical Ecstasy” album featuring an almighty emotional vocal from alcodrummer Bill Ward) and when it was all over I never listened to Gunnsunrosus again, even though I continued to buy their albums and CD singles. When I heard their cover of The Stones’ “Sympathy for the Devil” on the end credits to the awful “Interview with a Vampire” adaptation I thought I was going to spew. That was the official end point. Good luck, fuck off, and goodnight.

Anyway, to cut an increasingly long story short, the other day I was happily downloading a Pink Floyd gig from 1971 from a relatively harmless bootleg blog when I spotted nine allegedly "mastered, finished" tracks from Gunnsunrosus eagerly, er, awaited "Chinese Democracy" album, months after all the furore and excitement about them had died down and months after I had first saw them on th’internet.

“I wonder what the Axl Rose-led ‘band’ sound like?” I said to no one in particular, my curiosity peaked by a recent AC/DC purchase and a drunken bout of air guitaring, so I grabbed them.

And guess what? They are shit. They are so embarrassingly bad and so beyond normal standards of shit that I’d love to get Gillian McKeith in to have a rummage through them.

But shit doesn’t matter to bands like Gunnsunrosus who should, by right, be called brands. Fello brands like U2 haven’t released anything remotely interesting since “Pop” back in 1997 whilst it’s been so long since The Rolling Stones released anything decent that it’s doubtful whether there’s anyone old enough still alive to remember it.

Like all brands it is the actual release of the product that’s much more interesting than the actual product itself. Never mind all the digital prospects and new markets. Brands like Gunnsunrosus deliver to old habit creatures, so a physical release is where it’s at for these dinosaurs. According to reports from America, negotiations are well underway for "Chinese Democracy" to come out as an exclusive in Wal-Mart supermarkets only in the States. Holy Shit! What about the Salt Lake City version of Soundcellar? A deal like that makes the album title all the more pertinent doesn’t it? Democracy my ass. What about the little guy? Gunnsunrosus is now managed by big shots Front Line Management who also manage the business affairs of Christine Aguilera, Van Halen and bloody Aerosmith. They also manage that other “great” American brand The Eagles and last year they released their awful double disc MOR-fest "Long Road out of Eden" exclusively through Wal-Mart, much to the chagrin of every other merchant still left in business in the States. I’d never heard of this (sadly I heard The Eagles album) and then I read in Billboard that beloved Slane-bound veterans AC/DC are also releasing their next album exclusively through Wal-Mart. “Merchants were particularly incensed that the deal was apparently struck with the blessing of Columbia,” the report says. I bet they were.

Different or exclusive versions in different stores is nothing new, especially in America where, for example, David Gilmour’s “On an Island” had different formats for different stores, as did Bloc Party’s Grouse Lodge-recorded second album, whatever-it-was-called. And here we have Xtravision having movies for a month before others and the likes of Zavvi having different covers but this just sucks, and following other trends in the music business there’s no doubt we can expect similar things to happen in Ireland in, oh, about 40 years.

I hope people like Tommy in Soundcellar gets to stock “Chinese Democracy”. Like banks and backers needing Coldplay albums, people like Tommy in Soundceller need brands like Gunnsunrosus. I don’t, but I sure prefer to see places like Soundcellar still in business, but if you really want to hear Gunnsunrosus have a look around you’ll get those nine tracks of mp3 shite in all their glory.
Instead though, you should take a look at

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mOC_66hS4D8

It’s a short feature by Last Light Films. A nice piece of work, and they have a few more up there on YouTube. It's kind of like those business profiles you’d wished you’d written but only thought about them when the business was closed. There’s loads of them around, and now I’ve got time on my hands (book finished, back in the real world for a while, hello, hello, good to be back etc..) I’m gonna try and profile some of them as a New Years Resolution.

Wednesday, April 16, 2008

OUT TO LUNCH

Due to an acute case of food poisoning, Hot Lunch is taking a break for - ohh - about two months, but promises to return with even more badly written observations about nothing in particular oncehe learns the lesson that you cannot eat a carvery lunch after 1.40pm.

In the meantime Hot Lunch was delighted that his wild predictions for the Electric Picnic line-up last month were taken as the real thing by so many credible journalists, bloggers, message board posters and people in the music industry. Hot Lunch spent about ten minutes carefully cobbling a list together from acts who were playing festivals and who may have been close to Ireland in late August, and threw in a couple of curveballs for good measure. To see it reprinted as the real McCoy a day prior to the unveiling of the dismal real thing gave him a similar feeling of joy that eating three Tunnocks Tea Cakes in a row would bring.

On the subject of Tunnocks Tea Cakes, why can you get them in TEN PACKS in the North of Ireland and only in SIX PACKS down South? And how come Tunnocks Snowballs have yet to make it to Ireland?

Anyway, see you soon, in June, or maybe earlier.

Thursday, April 3, 2008

The Jimmy Cake "Spectre and Crown"

Here's an excitable review I wrote for a few regional papers about the best album I've heard in a good two years - The Jimmy Cake's awesome "Spectre and Crown" which is out on Pilatus Records on April 11th.

_______________

Get a slice of this – Third time lucky for The Jimmy Cake

If you only buy one album this year that has no lyrics, mixes classical music with the epic windswept post-rock and features some of the most beautifully structured music recorded in Ireland in decades, then make sure it’s “Spectre and Crown”, the long-awaited third album from the 18-legged groove machine that is Dublin instrumental collective The Jimmy Cake.

It is the best album yet from the instrumental leviathan, and it’s worth every single one of the five difficult years it took them to create it. The album is a moving, sweepingly beautiful, orchestral epic with nine life-enhancing tracks of such diversity and scope that it’s hard to fathom that just nine people made it. Listening to its most epic moments, you can picture over a hundred people crammed into a studio, perhaps with an orchestra in one corner, a string quartet or four in the other corner, a drummer, bassist and guitarist in the other corner, and a classical concert pianist or ten in the other corner.

“Spectre and Crown” opens with “Red Tony”, the deceptively calm first two minutes of which are just soothing piano and the threat of atmospherics. It then transforms into a lush, guitar and string piece, sliding in with such consummate ease that you’d swear it was made of feathers. As openings go, it’s as near to the opening of Pink Floyd’s “Dark Side of the Moon” as you’re ever going to get without a singer inviting you to “breathe in the air”. But you might as well, because as things just keep on getting better and better and better as the rest of the album opens out, you’ll drown in its lush aural embrace.

Alongside numerous classical music references from composers whose names I cannot spell, and operas I have never heard, there’s elements of the music and idealisms of bands such as Mogwai, The Cure, The Orb, Sophia, Can, The Who, Godspeed You Black Emperor, KLF and Explosions in the Sky scattered throughout this gorgeous disc; and hidden away you’ll find little elements such as a plucked banjo, an accordion, and more that gives the game away that this is actually an Irish band and not a state-funded musical experiment from the East.

The piano of Paul G. Smyth is the key to most of the tracks, especially “Jetta’s Place” which jaunts along to one of the most emotional crescendos The Jimmy Cake has ever put its name to. Their trademark brass section overload makes this one of, if not the best, tracks you’ll hear all year. Honestly.

As well as possessing the best song title in years, “The Arms That Came Out of the Wall” possesses a melancholic but surprisingly smooth juxtaposition of two bass guitars which recall a peaceful Alpine train journey up and through a mountain with The God Machine warming up in the next carriage. They guide it to the orchestra pit via a detour with a little self-contained acoustic rock band within a band and some synchronised slow hand-clapping. Please don’t allow that put you off though. When the accordions kicks in it all makes sense. Its seven minutes give the band barely enough time to arrive back to where they began, and when they do, you want them to start off on the journey again.

The album is all breathtaking, epic music, delivered with such belief and cohesion that it’s hard to believe that three of the members of the band are new guys, still being bedded in following the departure of a trio of founding members.

Still, the spirit of previous releases by the band - their gentle debut “Brains” and their schizophrenic and disappointing follow-up “Dublin Gone, Everybody Dead” - is there in all tracks, especially the five slow-burning minutes of the sweeping “Haunted Candle” which is extinguished by an orchestral build-up led by accordions. Elsewhere, “Collapsing Cloud Night...” is possibly the sweetest love song you’ll ever hear without lyrics, whilst “The Art of Wrecking” is one of the saddest pieces of rain-soaked string quartet music one will hear for quite some time. You could soundtrack 50 great movie deaths with it if you wanted to. The nine minutes of the rampaging“Hugs for Buddy” should evoke fonder memories, and no doubt will soundtrack years worth of artful nodding in the homes of anyone lucky enough to buy and fall in love with this beautiful album. It sounds like the conclusion to a concept album or rock opera The Who or Pink Floyd always wanted to make, but never could, as their roots were with rock and blues and not with the sweeping classic The Jimmy Cake were fed on. Instead they ended up producing flawed masterpieces such as “Tommy” and “Atom Heart Mother”. What sets The Jimmy Cake apart is that their roots are classical, and when they allow their multitude of other influences into the mix they end up making epic tracks like this.

Few bands have mastered how to melt the orchestral sweep of classical music with something that nearly resembles rock music, but The Jimmy Cake has, and with “Spectre and Crown” they have set a stunning template for other collectives, quartets and bands to follow. As it is, few records will reach the heights that this royally brilliant piece of work reaches. An instant and longterm classic.

Ten out of ten.

Weblink: www.thejimmycake.org

Please Queens of the Stone Age - give up now

I've been a QOTSA fan for pretty much all of their existence, and a massive Kyuss fan before that, and over the last couple of years I've kinda grown used to my beloved band losing the plot, particularly with the pretty hopeless "Era Vulgaris" album and the unfocussed mess that is "Lullabies to Paralyze". But I've stuck it out, as to me QOTSA represented everything great about American rock music, their first three records are unlike anything any band has released before or since, and they always delivered, even if the majority of the payload in recent years has been pretty weak material and an ever-fluctuating line-up. Still, there was the odd moment of magic on each disc, and the Desert Sessions has always been a welcome excursion. But when the parent band is eclipsed by the Desert Sessions collective something must be wrong.

Anyhow, I've tried to catch QOTSA every time they've been in Ireland, and even in such poxy surrounds as the Main Stage at Oxegen they have never failed or disappointed. But I've noticed a gradual decline in their stock, their interest, and and in Josh, their ginger beanpole leader, in recent years. Sure, the hired guns give it socks, but the band has been a shadow of its once great self for years now, and despite assuring myself that they will one day return to reach the heights they once did with consumate ease, it's been difficult to muster any enthusiasm for them as I once did. I can't even listen to the last two albums anymore they're that bad.

But the news that QOTSA are supporting LINKIN PARK in the RDS in Dublin at 70 QUID a ticket is the final straw for me.

The last time LINKIN PARK played Dublin it was at the same venue was with Metallica, The Darkness and a few others and they were bottled off the stage from the second they walked onto it. 40,000 people booed en masse during their set, the "DJ" goaded the crowd to try and hit him, and almost in slow motion, a beer bottle then curled through the air and hit him right on the forehead. So poor was the reception and the degree of hatred shown towards them when Chester Copperpot or whatever he's called unfurled a shop bought Irish tricolour that their set had to be cut short. It was magic stuff. Like Donington in the good old bottle of piss days. Even James Hetfield took the piss out of them when Metallica came on.

So, it's a sad end to a once great band like QOTSA to be playing second fiddle to an outfit like LP, and a it's a sad way to end my relationship with a once great band... but this is just the pits, and to me it sadly represents what QOTSA is about nowadays: Money. It's fuck the fans, fuck credibility and fuck their legacy. I wish Josh Homme would do the decent thing later this year and split the band, as support slots with the likes of Linkin Park undermines everything they have ever set out to achieve and represents the nadir of a decline into cliche.

I wish at this stage that Josh would just give it up, and stop pretending that QOTSA is a band. We know it's a nice cheque he's probably getting for the RDS but it's going to cost you a lot more in street cred.

So goodbye Josh, my lovely friend, your band means no more,
I hope we'll meet again, I've lost you now for sure
Goodbye my lovely friend, I loved you from the start
I knew that it would end, but didn't have the heart to see us part
No I must go.

Tuesday, March 25, 2008

Latitude Ireland "will not happen this year"

Latitude - not coming to a country near you soon

The proposed Irish staging of UK festival 'Latitude' at Belvedere House Gardens and Park in Mullingar, Co. Westmeth over the weekend of July 18 -20 has been postponed.

Although the venue, which has played host to the Hi:Fi and Midlands Music Festival in recent years, was booked for Latitude and plans were submitted to its owners, Westmeath County Council, by Festival Republic (which Irish giants MCD have a share in) the festival was called off earlier this month.

A Council spokesperson told Hot Lunch that Latitude "will not happen this year" or possibly any other year for that matter. The local authority and the management of Belvedere are said to be devestated that the high-profile maiden voyage for the festival has been nixed. Earlier this year there was THREE music festivals booked for Belvedere, which is undoubtedly the finest festival site in Ireland. Now, it looks like there will be none. As On the Record said last week, the Irish festival market is in a state of flux, with some high profile casualties including both the Midlands Music Festival and Garden Party for POD Concerts, who are rumoured to have lost money on both. MCD, their main rivals, even struggled to shift tickets for the teenage rite-of-passage that is the Oxegen festival. It's line up was pitched at the oldies and, it has to be said, is the one of the weakest Oxegen line-up in years with plenty of old timers on stage to confuse the kids who have made this festival a no-go area for most self respecting music fans in recent years.

But POD have an ace in their sleeve, and that is the peerless Electric Picnic, the line-up of which is being announced tomorrow (Wednesday). Latitude itself was modelled on the Picnic (or Leccy Piccy as Hot Press inanely call it) and with Latitude falling by the wayside, and MCD not able to tie in acts for a twin festival (as they do with T In The Park/Oxegen) that now isn't happening it's technically been 'open season' for a number of acts on the UK Latitude bill, which no doubt means we'll be seeing Sigur Ros, Franz Ferdinand and the brilliant Elbow play the Electric Picnic this year.

Monday, March 24, 2008

Delorentos tour hell

Delorentos, who should have won the Choice Music Prize last month, are in the US of A at the moment. Well, kind of. Have a read of their tour diary here

It's quite brilliant.

Hot Lunches Electric Picnic predictions part 2

Dear God, please get your favourite band Slayer to play the Electric Picnic.

Ok, two days to go until the announcement of theElectric Picnic line-up and Hot Lunch is going to take a punt at predicting some of the bigger acts.

Before we begin, let me be the first to announce that Portishead will NOT be playing in Stradbally this year, contrary to much rumour.

(As good as) definites: My Bloody Valentine, Sex Pistols (meh), Moby, Tindersticks, Underworld, Super Furry Animals, Fat Boy Slim, The Breeders, Elbow, CSS (now living in Ballinasloe by all accounts), George Clinton and a load of random people pretending to be one of his bands, Chic featuring Nile Rogers, Gary Numan, The Human League, 808 State, The Orb, Franz Ferdinand, Mogwai, Faust, Neon Neon, Jamie Liddell, Foals, Lee Scratch Perry, Baaba Mal, The Wedding Present, Sebastien Tellier, Henry Rollins, Billy Bragg, Marty Mulligan, Saul Williams, Booka Shade, Transglobal Underground, Two Gallants, King Creosote, Joe Lean And The Jing Jang Jong, Damien Bloody Rice, The Duke Spirit, Crystal Castles, Tinariwen, Red Snapper, Fuck Buttons, Micah P Hinson, Dan le Sac Vs Scroobius Pip, Fish Go Deep, Grand National, Lisa Hannigan, Cinephile, Kings of Convenience, David Kitt, Donal Dineen, Gemma Hayes, Gossip, Plaid, Kevin Rowland, Rodrigo y Gabriela, Two Gallants blah blah blah.

Good Chance: Fat Boy Slim, Massive Attack, Paul Weller, James, Bloc Party, Fat Freddy's Drop, Mighty Boosh (they really need to shake up the comedy tent this year and lose Des Bishop et al), Cornelius, Buzzcocks, DJ Krush, Supergrass, The Coral, Bonnie Prince Billy, Notwist, Goldfrapp, Calexico, Jimmy Cliff, Robyn, Hayseed Dixie, Low, Dirty Three...

Long shots: The Cure, Paul Simon, Flaming Lips, Sigur Ros, Mercury Rev, Cypress Hill.

Fingers Crossed: The KLF (one-off reformation?), Masters of Reality, Cinematic Orchestra, Slayer and, er, John Shuttleworth.

Garden Party a goner

Garden Party, that fabulous little festival at Ballinlough Castle, County Westmeath, is no more. Like the dead parrot that is the Midlands Music Festival, it has ceased to be.

Held amidst the walled gardens of the Nugent estate in Ballinlough, the festival arrived in style over the June Bank Holiday in 2006 with a savage little line-up that included the ubiquitous 2 Many DJ's, The Orb, Asian Dub Foundation, Super Discount Live, Andy Cato, Carl Craig, Tony Humphries, Buck 65, Fat Freddy's Drop, Sean Rowley and Guilty Pleasures, AIM, Scrath Perberts and loads more besides. A sort of mini-Electric Picnic, it featured the small-scale Body & Soul Area, loads of good food and drink and a beautiful laid-back atmosphere. The sun shone all day too which obviously led to the erection of the 'sold out' signs and led to the feelgood factor that Garden Party would return in 2007 as a two-day festival! It was everything Hi-Fi, who took place a month or so later, wasn't. It reminded me of the first Electric Picnic in 2004, like it was your own secret festival with an up-for-it crowd and a deadly buzz in the car park, the hallmark of a good festival. It also had what is without doubt the best outdoor/indoor tent I have ever seen at an Irish festival. I'll try and scan a pic of it in later.

The following year Daft Punk were lined up to headline one of the two nights of Garden Party 2007 and everything was looking rosey in the garden. Then, the French lads were poached elsewhere and the line-up below them began to crumble. It was back to the drawing board and it became a one-day event once again, but even though it had camping, a boisterous car park and the sunshine (the only day the sun shone in June as it turned out) it had a terrible line up with Von Sudenfed feat. Mark E. Smith, Hot Chip, Vitalic and Pet Shop Boys the only decent 'names'. Below them was muck like Carl Cox, and a load of Irish DJ's on a reduced number of stages. But again, the vibe was fantastic and in the walled garden in particular it was something to behold. But the absence of a large swathe of the Body & Soul crew was noticable, and there wasn't the same extras and attention to detail that one had grown accustomed to after the first Garden Party and three Electric Picnics. There was no way it was making money either.

Still, it was a cracking night all told, and again promises were made for a two-day event in 2008. However, I suppose there's only so many losses you can take, and POD have parked it for this summer, alongside the Midlnds Music Festival. It's a tragedy really, for Meath and Westmeath where the events were held, and for the greater good of the Irish festival scene. Mantua and Life in Galway (which has an awesome line up this year - http://www.life-festival.com ) will no doubt take over and, if they are organised properly, eclipse Garden Party, but the organised chaos that happens at Life is a little scary, you never know when the crust will crumble, whereas at something like Garden Party, you kind of knew you were in safe hands, and the vibe was all good. It'll be missed that's for sure, and like Midlands, we can only hope that it returns next summer.

Friday, March 14, 2008

Old man not playing in Cork shocker!

D'yawan hash or E's?

Not every rock dinosaur is playing Cork this summer. Paul "Al" Simon is only playing at the Electric Picnic! Or maybe he's playing Kilmainham? Anyway, POD have him and he won't be playing in a big top in Cork.

Also in the frame for the Electric Picnic: Coldplay! The chaps are weighing up their summer festival options and Picnic is one of them. They've stuck with MCD in the past so if Latitude doesn't happen in Belvedere this July then they'll probably end up in Malahide or Marlay Park. So maybe you didn't read it here first.

Krautrock legends Faust will keep me happy. They've confirmed they are goiung to play! The Orb, who were brutal at Garden Party 2 years ago are also confirmed and you can bet good money that Portishead will be there too. Cash hungry on their last legs "punks" Sex Pistols are another cert. Underworld are also 100% certs to be headlining either the Main Stage or one of the tents on the Saturday night. The lovely Elbow are also back, Tindersticks are also lined up, as are Supergrass. Repeating 2005's line up Flaming Lips (if they don't do Lovebox) and Fatboy Slim are set to play. Another returning act is the mighty Mogwai. The Cure's name has been mentioned too, as had Cypress Hill which would be fucking mega. Gemma Hayes, Henry Rollins, Saul Williams and Billy Bragg are also playing. There's loads more but none of them will probably turn up so I'll stop now.

Oh, most importantly, the eight colouredy squares on the website have now multiplied.

The whole thing will be launched on March 26th.

The cinema tent better show 'Midnight Run' this year that's all I'm sayin'...

Thursday, March 13, 2008

Going to Malahide or Cork in June?

Neil Young. Where does one begin? I dunno. Anyway, he's here in the summer and I'll be at both shows the big sap I am. I had an awful fear about the Malahide show as it's the height of the summer, it's outdoors and you know, it's just not right is it? So i bought some Cork tickets as well. I've enjoyed gigs at both venues over the past few years (Roger Waters in Cork being the zenith Leeside, and the little reggae tent at Lovebox last year being the highlight of Dublin's great outdoors) but I'd much rather see him in a darkened tent in Cork than the daylit display that is going to be an outdoor show at the end of June.

If you need some homework in advance, as if, then check out the great man in Amsterdam last month here

One of the best reasons to sign up for a Rapidshare Account

Shoegazing special part 2

Slowdive (left) - great fringe action

Listening to (and Youtubing) Ride the other day got Hot Lunch all shoegazey and since then the flour and food splattered speakers of the Hot Lunch kitchen stereo have been put to a test of Titanic proportions with extraordinary amounts of reverb, floppy fringes and assorted old cassette compilations all vying for aural attention. If Alan McGee called over to collect a few royalties he'd be going home armed with enough dough to buy a sliced pan.

The teatowels were removed from their pins to soak up a few tears when Slowdive evoked beautiful long drives to Galway and around Connemara, and magical, mystical nights in a charming kip of a house in Wellpark. Slowdive were a band I managed to miss twice when I had a clearcut chance to see them, and boy do I regret it. They toured with Ride in '92 too, what a gig that would have been... Anyway, there's a couple of live shows recorded for posterity here There was a cracking American site up a few years ago that was full of unreleased and rare stuff but it's, eh, gone.

After the release of the compilation "Catch the Breeze" in 2004, all of Slowdive's studio albums - "Just For a Day!, "Souvlaki" and "Pygmalio" - were reissued in 2005 with a raft of extra tracks etc. They're well worth picking up somewhere or other.

After Slowdive, a few of them got together as Mojave 3 who have released five fine albums on 4AD, whilst solo-wise Nick Halstead released one of the finest singer/songwriter albums with 2001's "Sleeping on Roads", again released on 4AD. It's an awesome disc with "See You on Rooftops" the nearest thing you'll ever get to folky showgazing. If you find it anywhere, do not hesitate in picking it up. He has a couple of tracks, including "...Rooftops", up on his myspace He toured Ireland back in 2001, but he didn't get very far as a certain person in MCD at the time was looking for outragous guarantees to put him on. He's touring again this summer, so hopefully we'll see another solo album soon. It'll be hard to top the sublime "Sleeping on Roads".

Swervedriver were another good Creation band from back in the day (before McGee's egomania and Oasis came in a destroyed the label). They never attained the greatness of Ride, Slowdive or My Bloody Valentine, but they had their moments, especially on debut album "Raise" and it's follow-up "Mezcal Head". Rather nicely for the fans, Swervedriver have made the choice cuts from hundreds of bootlegs available on their website, with the album running orders faithfully reproduced albeit in live form. You can download them from here The band has reformed for a tour this year, hopefully it'll swing by Ireland though that's highly unlikely...

Some of their solo and side-project stuff since their first split has been good, particularly the Toshack Highway spin-off which featured Sophia and God Machine stalworth Robin Proper-Shepard on a couple of tracks. Their best bits can be found on 'Everyday, Rock'n'Roll Is Saving My Life Vol. 2'

Wednesday, March 12, 2008

Ride - OX4 (live)

And here's Ox4 live at Brixton Academy.

Ride OX4

Possibly Ride's finest hour, though I'm not so sure of the grunge kid returns home video..

Up until they blew it with the Andy Bell-fest that is the misfiring 'Tarantula' Ride were probably the finest of the showgazing bands, and certainly one of Creation Records most astute signings. MBV were just too aloof, whilst Slowdive only occasionally made good their early promise, but Ride gripped in a way both of these never could. There was a best of both worlds vibe to them in that they embraced the wildness and fuzziness you'd expect with a bank of effect pedals and floppy fringes, but they also had real heart, as "Ox4" from the masterly "Going Blank Again" album demonstrates.

It's a song that forever invokes my last ever day at college, coming on as it did on a compilation tape as I confidently walked out of an exam hall into near certain unemployment. Ahh, happy days...

Everytime I hear RIDE these days though I always wonder what if? And I still wonder what possessed Andy Bell to join Oasis in the arse end of the 1990's. After years of wondering I managed to ask him when Quoasis played Marlay Park, and he politely rubbed his fingers together...

Ride - Leave Them All Behind (The Word)

It lacks the killer intro, but how's about this for shoegazing gold?

Friday, March 7, 2008

Careful With That Axe Eric, here's some more Zeppelin

Further to the ongoing Zeppelin live shenanigans, the excellent Quality Boots blog has some outstanding Flac files (be warned, they take up acres of hard drive space) from some of the best Zepp bootlegs going. It also has a rare Roger Waters live bootleg recorded during the Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking tour when Eric Clapton was playing guitar with him. Waiting to get into the office to download the Zepp stuff, but Waters/Clapton is decent quality. Not great mind you but it does the job. Have a bouse here: http://qualityboots.blogspot.com/

Breeders

Good interview with Kim Deal in Today's Irish Times. This may be of some value to you if you like 'em... If you're asked for a p/word then 77775

MC5 demos, rarities

Get your kicks with these hard to find MC5 kicks... or something...

01 Baby Wont Ya (1970 unreleased version)
02 Sister Ann (Sonic on vocals)
03 I'm Mad Like Eldridge Cleaver (27th Oct 68)
04 Ice Pick Slim (26th May 68)
05 Train Music
06 The Pledge Song
07 Baby Please Don't Go
08 Looking At You
09 Power Trip

Wednesday, March 5, 2008

Page and Plant in Paris

Further to the Led Zeppelin reunion bootleg (below), here's a Page and Plant concert from Paris in 1998. Quality is ok, they were better in Dublin mind you!

Disc 1 One
Disc 2 Two

McSpaced

The horror, the horror! One of the finest ever UK sitcoms, Spaced, is getting the US remake treatment. Perhaps not surprisingly Simon Pegg, Edgar Wright, and Jessica Stevenson - the show's creators- are not involved in it in any way at all. In fact they weren’t event told the remake was happening until the deposit was paid to the landlord. All three have come out against what they're calling "McSpaced".

Charlie's Angels director McG (who?) is in the directors chair whilst Will and Grace star Debra Messing with take on the 'Daisy' role and balding former child star son of an Irish American arms dealer and star of 'The Mike O'Malley Show' (no, me neither) Mike O'Malley will become wannabe 2000AD artist Tim. No word yet on who’ll be portraying ‘Wheels’, the moadouva courier, but my money’s on David Holmes. No doubt they'll turn Mike into a Harlem globe-trotting Iraqi war vet with a heart of gold and Tony Danza is sure to pop up somewhere, probably as Bilbo Bagshot...

Simon Pegg is not too pleased with the remake, although with one eye on his burgeoning Hollywood career he gives it a cautious welcome in his official statement (below).

'Spaced' was an absolute gem of a series, and like all the great sit-coms it was retired early by its creators - after only two series. Pegg and Wright went onto the movies and lived happily ever after, and Pegg will soon turn up as Scotty in the upcoming Star Trek movie. Even though 'Spaced' absolutely reeks of the 90's in parts, it's humour hasn't dated a bit and it stands up to repeated viewings, and alongside the overlooked and exceedingly under-rated 'Early Doors', 'Fr. Ted' and the 'Royal Family' it's probably the nearest thing we've come to 'Fawlty Towers' in the last 20 years.

SIMON’S OFFICIAL STATEMENT REGARDING THE US SPACED

Now that the pilot has been officially announced, I thought it might be a good idea to clarify my position on the subject. The whole affair seems to have inspired some spirited debate and some heartening displays of loyalty and love. All this for a show which is almost 10 years old, is all rather wonderful and a vindication of all the blood, sweat and tears (both of joy and pain) we shed in the show’s creation. It was always our aim to create a comedy which spoke to its audience on such a personal level, it almost felt one on one. It would seem the fan reaction to the news that Fox has appropriated the format, confirms at least, that we succeeded.

As far as remaking TV shows for different territories is concerned, I don’t have a problem. The Office remake being a perfect example. Yes, the original British version is a wonderful and compact piece of comedy writing and performance, but I think it’s bit much to expect a large scale American television audience to fully relate to the minutiae of day-to-day business life in an obscure British suburb. I’m sure if you’re reading this, you are the type of person who takes pleasure in the variety of entertainment you enjoy, relishing the differences between our various cultural touchstones but there is a massive audience out there, which perhaps isn’t as culturally savvy (euphemistic phrase for ‘geeky’) as we are and need their signifiers to be a little more familiar. So, Slough is replaced by Scranton, and the office archetypes become a little more archetypal to an American audience. The spirit of the show remains intact. The performances are uniformly great and the show scores big ratings and wins EMMYs, whether we as comedy purists prefer the original or not. The success of the remake is born out by it’s undoubted success and appeal.

My main problem with the notion of a Spaced remake is the sheer lack of respect that Granada/ Wonderland/Warner Bros have displayed in respectively selling out and appropriating our ideas without even letting us know. A decision I can only presume was made as a way of avoiding having to give us any money, whilst at the same time using mine and Edgar’s name in their press release, in order to trade on the success of Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, even professing, as Peter Johnson did, to being a big fan of the show and it’s creators. A device made all the more heinous by the fact that the press release neglected to mention the show’s co-creator and female voice, Jessica Hynes (nee Stevenson). The fact is, when we signed our contracts ten years ago, we had neither the experience or the kudos to demand any clauses securing any control over future reversioning. We signed away our rights to any input in the show’s international future, because we just wanted to get the show made and these dark days of legal piracy seemed a far away concern. As a result, we have no rights. The show does not belong to us and, those that do own it have no obligation to include us in any future plans. You would perhaps hope though, out of basic professional respect and courtesy, we might have been consulted. It is this flagrant snub and effective vote of no confidence in the very people that created the show, that has caused such affront at our end. If they don’t care about the integrity of the original, why call it Spaced? Why attempt to find some validation by including mine and Edgar’s names in the press release as if we were involved? Why not just lift the premise? Two strangers, pretend to be a couple in order to secure residence of a flat/apartment. It’s hardly Ibsen. Jess and I specifically jumped off from a very mainstream sitcom premise in order to unravel it so completely. Take it, have it, call it Perfect Strangers and hope Balkie doesn’t sue. Just don’t call it Spaced.

It’s a shame, since the pilot is now a certainty, whether we like it or not, a simple phone call and a few reassurances might have helped to at least curtail the tide of indignation from fans and creators alike. I have, as of yet, heard nothing.

Simon Pegg

Science explains Amy Winehouse's face

Oxegen bound, collapsing doll dancing Amy Winehouse (left) has been diagnosed with the comtagious condition impetigo. Here's a scientific definition of the disease:

"Impetigo starts as a red sore that quickly ruptures, oozes for a few days and then forms a yellowish-brown crust that looks like honey or brown sugar. The disease is highly contagious, and scratching or touching the sores is likely to spread the infection to other parts of the body as well as to other people."

Wow. What a classy, healthy lady to be around. Wonder if Paddy Power are giving odds on her not showing up at that other scabby skin fest in July?

Tuesday, March 4, 2008

Erm...

Here's the trailer for a new movie called Pathology.

Monday, March 3, 2008

Led Zeppelin at the O2

According to the NME, Led Zeppelin are not going to tour despite obscene amounts of money being thrown at them from all directions. I'm kinda happy they're not, really, as I've always enjoyed Percy Plant's solo career and preferred the 'Unledded' set he did with Jimmy Page to much of the more bombastic Zeppelin stuff. Everyone wants the bombastic Zeppelin back, and whilst this is no bad thing, I feel the recent 'Mothership' best-of set was a let down as it concentrated more on this side than on the more acoustic, progressive and bluesy side. It creates such an expectation that if they went out and reimagined a lot of the songs as they did with the unplugged thing (and to a lesser extent with the subsequent Page and Plant tour - which was one of my Top 10 Point Depot gigs and the only time I've fainted at a concert) they'd be bottled off the stage. Well, maybe not, but there'd be a lot of shuffling of feet to the bar.

According to the NME: "Led Zeppelin will not play live again together, according to a source close to the band’s singer, Robert Plant.The Sunday Mirror newspaper quotes an anonymous source as saying that the band have turned down a £100 million offer to tour, with Plant’s own non-Led Zeppelin musical plans the reason for the decision.The newspaper quotes the source as saying: “Despite the enormous offer, the decision did not come down to money. They always said they would do the one-off show and then see how they felt.“Jimmy [Page, guitarist] enjoyed the concert in December enough to want to tour. He argued they still had something to offer. He likes the idea of another chapter in the band – the grown-up tour. “John [Paul Jones, bassist] sided with Jimmy. He loved making music with the others again. But Robert [Plant] wanted to leave last year's concert as their legacy. They had proved they could still do it and that was enough.“He has other commitments and is happier looking forward to those. Robert put the mockers on the tour.”

So now. Saying all that I would have loved to have been at the O2 show, especially just to see/hear what Jason Bonham was like behind the kit. The last place I'd seen him was in some awful reality TV metal show with Ted Nugent, Scott Ian from Anthrax, that Bach twat from Skid Row who won't say what Jon Bon Jovi really did to him and some dude from Biohazard with a serious porn problem so he had a lot of making up to do. Although I think he faked an injury to get out of that particular show...

I've heard a few bootlegs of it to date but this one is probably the best I've found. Again, it's from that mighty source of live sets, Big O. The best live review of that show was a gorgeous piece from Mark Ellen in The Word, perhaps the only review to give Bonham Jr a bit of credit.

Richard Hawley for Oxegen

Balls! Not only is it snowing outside and NOT sticking, but now Richard Hawley has become the straw that broke the camel's back and looks like dragging me to a racecourse in Punchestown for three days in July. I always say I'm not going, and I always go anyway, but this year was going to be a definite no-no. Then they started announcing acts and I got very tempted. And now today, with Hawley and Battles joining another handful I want to see I'm very, very tempted.

Good to see that tradition is being maintained and absolutely feck all Irish acts have been announced. How did Ten Spee.. Future Kings of Spain manage to become the first of all TWO acts annonced thus far?

Anyway, Hawley joins the fakest band in the world, the frankly ridiculous Editors with their annoying pretend-spa frontman Tom Shit, ginger crusty Newton Faulkner, Kate Nash, The Zutons, The Hoosiers, Scouting for Girls, Roisin Murphy, Pendulum, Lightspeed Champion, Bowling For Soup, and previously announced Kings of Leon, R.E.M., The Verve, Rage Against The Machine, Kaiser Chiefs, The Prodigy, The Fratellis, Interpol, Chemical Brothers, Counting Crows, Stereophonics, The Raconteurs, Ian Brown, Hot Chip, Justice, Panic At The Disco, The Feeling, Aphex Twin, Band Of Horses, Seasick Steve, The Courteeners, Future Kings Of Racer, Alabama 3, DJ Koze, Kaz James, Crookers and Battles (how did they get Battles?) in Punchestown in July. I see they're doing day tickets again. Good call MCD. Hopefully you'll sort the fucking parking out this year.

Check in on Shane Meadows' website for a couple of Hawley vidz and some behind the scenes malarky.

Snow is getting heavier, maybe it WILL stick! Holy fuck, it is sticking.

EDIT - It stuck for half an hour. I managed to eat some for lunch. It's now pissing hailstones. Or shitting hailstones or whatever swear word applies to them...

Jeff Healey RIP

I was shocked to learn this morning that legendary blues and jazz guitarist Jeff Healey has died aged just 41. The gifted Canadian had battled cancer his entire life, and lung and leg cancer got him in the end. Healey had lost his eyesight to a rare form of the disease, Retinoblastoma, at the age of one. He started playing guitar aged three, and slung the guitar unconventionally across his lap. His first band recorded when he was 17. The musician had performed with such acclaimed guitar players over the years as B. B. King, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Albert Collins, Mark Knopler and George Harrison. He had one of the biggest collections of 78rpm records in the world, and he got into the DJ's chair many years ago with a syndicated radio show like Dylan's one. He also appeared as the leader of the house band behind some chicken wire in the dumb fun kick-ass Patrick Swayze movie 'Roadhouse'. Even Beavis and Buttlead liked him. He was just about to release a new album 'Mess of Blues' and was due to appear on Jools Holland next month. R.I.P.

Here's a kind of best of. linky

the album Get Me Some

Sufjan Stevens?

Sufjan Stevens is strongly believed to be heading for the Electric Picnic. If you believe last FM, he's in the area that week. An announcement of sorts on the festival is to be made this Friday. Flaming Lips, Super Furry Animals, and Elbow are all set to return to Stradbally. There's talk of The Cure too. Hopefully with My Bloody Valentine on the bill they stick in a load of shoegazers, although i don't think they'll convince RIDE and Slowdive to reform somehow.

Whatever happened to Sufjan's proposed 'album per state' concept?

Anyway, here's where his father believes those albums are hiding...

Supergrass at the BBC

Supergrass have a new album out in the next wee while, so why not bask in some of their former glories? Below you'll find a soundboard recording of Supergrass live at the BBC Maida Vale Studios, on September 30th, 2002. There's plenty of classic Supergrass in it, up through to the slightly unfocussed 'Life on Other Planets' LP. Hence quite a bit of 'here's one from ou new LP'. They bounced back from that album in some style with the streamlined 'Road to Rouen' in 2005. It's a certified classic, although nobody bought it. Not sure what to make of the bits of new album 'Diamond Hoo Haa' I've heard thus far. There's a class of a video below.

Tracklist for the BBC Session:Grace; Rush Hour Soul; Pumping On Your Stereo; Moving; Seen The Light; Funniest Thing; Brecon Beacons; Prophet 15; Never Done Anything Like That Before; Richard III; Sun Hits The Sky; Caught By The Fuzz. Linky

This bollocks

<- How did this cunt get the job as RTE's Boxing Correspondant? Did they pick his name out from a hat or something? His lack of anything approaching a personality surely makes him the worst possible candidate to be sent out to Greece to follow the actions of Ireland's Olympic boxing hopefuls. His ineptitude is just plain embarassing.

Anyway, well done to John Joe Nevin on securing an Olympics berth. That's two Olympians from poor backgrounds in the midlands - and literally from the same Council estate in Mullingar - on their way to Beijing. Nevin joins long distance runner Mark Fagan on the plane over to the promised land.

The Nevin family name has been dragged through the mud in recent years by the actions of some members of John Joe's distant family - and some of their cousins - and he could easily have been led down a path which currently leads directly to a massive ongoing turf war in Mullingar, Athlone and Longford, but like Galway man Francie Barrett before him, John Joe and his father were not afraid to break the mould, and their dedication and belief in what they were doing has led them closer to the ultimate prize. Hopefully more will follow them over.

All in all, it's a terrific time to be involved in Irish boxing, with Dunne, Duddy, Lee and a host of others all impressing greatly in the past year, but why RTE (who have an enviable amount of talent in their sports dept) have chosen the most clueless, charmless, rural pitchside reporter, a king of inept, unimaginative, unthoughtout quips, to be their ringside man is beyond contemplation..

Friday, February 29, 2008

Can we have a krautrock special?

Can enjoy a toot

The only thing that bugs me about Tim Sweeney's wonderful Beats in Space series of mixes is the interviews. If you download a mix by a certain DJ in a flurry of excitement, and as you eagerly depress the arrow button, the initial reaction is invariably frustration as you get lumbered with a ten minute interview after the first track. Still, it's a small quibble, as pound for pound the mixes usually always deliver.

One I'm digging at the moment is a Krautrock special with Mike Simonetti, downloadable from here or streamable from here It opens with a live edit of Can's mighty "Vitamin C" before a tedious interview. Then it's down to business with two scary German funk tracks from Supermax. No, not the burger chain, but they do have an affinity for food as "Push Push (Sexy Chocolate Girl)" testifies. I'd heard this track years ago and thought it was a piss take, but no it's a real-life chunk of krautrock funk about making sweet love to a lady made from chocolate. Supermax then show Thom Yorke a thing or two about breathing during a song with "Be What You Are". La Dusseldorf's "White Overalls" reminds me of films set in the snow, like the awesome Gorky Park. Things get classical for a while before the spacey side of Krautrock comes back in with the lovely, velvety speaker swapping drums of Niagra. I love that spacey production technique they used to use on krautrock albums, it's like the music is breathing, running away from you, and then back around you and with you and off again. I can't get on a DART anymore without thinking of Can's "Safe" because of it. The best, funkiest drummers were krautrock guys. Wait til you hear those drums from about 44 minutes on. Anyway, Niagra also remind me of the mighty Hawkwind without the barmy poetry. There then follows some Neu!, Amon Duul II and some Tyndall (backed by Can) as well as some uncredited stuff, before Tim Sweeney takes over for the second half of this show with a bonkers disco mix which features remixes of Rufus and Chaka Khan, the Pointer Sisters and Hot Chip (no, really).

I was a relative latecomer to Krautrock. I always thought that my Can and Kraftwerk LP's would be enough, but the world out there beyond them is a mighty place of frustrating but often very rewarding intrigue and Mike's mix is as good a place as any to start...

De La Soul

Someone mentioned De La Soul to me today which got me thinking: What was their greatest album? And it is this one. Enjoy.

Ryan Adams in Paris

Big O has put a cracking Ryan Adams bootleg back up for a week. It features his spinetingling cover of Alice in Chains "Down in a Hole" and much more besides. It's not the best Ryan Adams gig (he's a little bored with it all) but it's worth a listen.

Get it right here.

Shock! Horror! Men of a certain vintage make atrocious list

The Irish Times brigade of rock critics have made another terrible list! Yes, you'd think they would have learned by now wouldn't you, but the critics who have been responsible for some of the best broadsheet music writing just cannot seem to get it right when it comes to lists.

Their Top 40 Irish Albums here is a largely predictable and safe mix of dated 80's and early 90's Irish rock which obviously had a profound effect on some of the writers at the time the records were released, but it's stupifying to think that much of it is remembered yet alone deemed memorable today. Perhaps having so much time on their hands 'back in the day' when they were hungry, leather-jacket and paisley-shirted clad hacks might have something to do with it? The fast-paced life of a multimedia rock critic these days obviously leaves these redoubtable men with very little time on their hands to get close to, or live with an album they way they could back in the good old days when there was only a handful of releases coming through the letterbox, and a full-scale arts section like The Ticket was something you couldn't even dare to dream about when you were clattering away at a typewriter or a word processor!

But whatever the reason for the slant towards boring, dated albums, the fact that such unspeakable shite such as The Blades, Something Happens, High Llamas, Stars of Heaven, and the most overdubbed live album of all time from Thin Lizzy is in there, as well as far too many albums from single acts (has anyone under the age of 40 even heard at least one Microdisney album, let along two? Has anyone outside Dublin actually sat through two Blades albums? Has Van Morrison really released three decent albums? Do The Undertones deserve two berths?) and career worst albums from Snow Patrol and The Frames, as well as one of the weakest Divine Comedy discs (was it included as a classic 'I heard of them before they were massive' gambit?) are in there ahead of dozens of great albums made in the last 15 years (any number of acts from David Kitt to Kila, Redneck Manifesto to Jimmy Cake, Ann Scott to Mundy, Damien Dempsey to The Walls/The Stunning, The Immediate to Pugwash, Delorentos to Cathy Davey, Luka Bloom to Little Palace, Duke Special to Jape) says much for the vintage of these men and the wisdom in getting their heads together for a good old list.

I'm a relatively old fart too, but I wouldn't be shouting it from the rooftop by praising indescrimate shite such as Stars of Heaven and The Radiators. Even the Hothouse Flowers had more to offer than these atrocious acts. Still, at least they got their number one right and at least they remembered that some good albums have been produced in recent years by the likes of Therapy, Bell X1 and, er, that's it.

It's interesting to note too that there is literally nothing from the 60's and very little from the 70's, whilst the folk and trad worlds get a token mention with a live album from Hayes and Cahill that nobody has ever seen in a shop, and a token mention for Planxty. Should they not have at least invited Siobhan Long into their private members club? Or would she have remembered something from the last 12 years? The elctronica and dance fields are also ignored, save for David Holmes' dated but still slightly vibrant collection of stretched samples "Let's Get Killed".

There's a good oul arguement going on at On The Record about it now. It's highly recommended reading.

Anyway, lest we all fall asleep in memory of the good old days in search of the next U2, the list is:
1 MY BLOODY VALENTINE: LOVELESS (1991)
2 U2: ACHTUNG BABY (1991)
3a A HOUSE: I AM THE GREATEST (1991)
3b THE RADIATORS: GHOSTOWN (1979)
5 VAN MORRISON: ASTRAL WEEKS (1968)
6 MICRODISNEY: THE CLOCK COMES DOWN THE STAIRS (1985)
7 ROLLERSKATE SKINNY: HORSEDRAWN WISHES (1996)
8 THE POGUES: RUM, SODOMY & THE LASH (1986)
9 THE UNDERTONES: THE UNDERTONES (1979)
10 WHIPPING BOY: HEARTWORM (1995)
11 ASH: 1977 (1996)
12 THE BLADES: RAYTOWN REVISITED (1985)
13 THIN LIZZY: LIVE AND DANGEROUS (1978)
14 U2: THE JOSHUA TREE (1987)
15 THERAPY? TROUBLEGUM (1994)
16 PLANXTY: PLANXTY (1973)
17 DAVID HOLMES: LETS GET KILLED (1997)
18 THE STARS OF HEAVEN: SPEAK SLOWLY (1988)
19 nSTIFF LITTLE FINGERS: INFLAMMABLE MATERIAL (1979)
20a THE REVENANTS: HORSE OF A DIFFERENT COLOUR
20b THE STARS OF HEAVEN: SACRED HEART HOTEL
22 U2: BOY (1980)
23 THE BLADES: LAST MAN IN EUROPE (1984)
24 MY BLOODY VALENTINE: ISN'T ANYTHING (1988)
25 SINÉAD O'CONNOR: I DO NOT WANT WHAT I HAVEN'T GOT (1990)
26 VAN MORRISON: MOONDANCE (1970)
27 SNOW PATROL: EYES OPEN (2006)
28b RORY GALLAGHER: LIVE IN EUROPE (1972)
30 VAN MORRISON: IT'S TOO LATE TO STOP NOW (1974)
31a BELL X1: MUSIC IN MOUTH (2003)
33a THE FRAMES: FOR THE BIRDS (2001 )
33b SOMETHING HAPPENS: STUCK TOGETHER WITH GOD'S GLUE (1990)
35a MARTIN HAYES & DENIS CAHILL: LIVE IN SEATTLE (1999)
35b THE HIGH LLAMAS: HAWAII (1996)
35c THE UNDERTONES: HYPNOTISED (1980)
38 DAMIEN RICE: O (2002)
39 THE POGUES: IF I SHOULD FALL FROM GRACE WITH GOD (1988)
40 MICRODISNEY: CROOKED MILE (1987)