Falling Sky

Do Do Do Do Do Do-Do

It would appear that Typepad now has a new inbuilt MP3 player functionality going on, so the following is basically to test whether it works or not.  But as it's a solid gold TUNE, feel free to have a listen - in keeping with the Synth Britannia docu on BBC4, it's Don't Go by Yazoo from their Peel Session back in 1982.

 Yazoo: Don't Go (Peel Session)

TWOF: 10 Aug - 16 Aug

First up, for no other reason except that it gives me great joy, the History Eraser Button sequence from the 'Space Madness' episode of ye olde Ren & Stimpy.  Good times, good times.

Right.  Urlesque ran this cracking picture from National Geographic, days before the papers got their mitts on it.  Chances are you've already seen it, but just in case:

Melissa Brandts and her husband stopped to take a photo using their camera's self-timer while vacationing in Canada. Intrigued by the sounds of the camera, a curious ground squirrel came over to check things out and popped into the frame right at the perfect moment...

A fine example of photobombing, a collection of the cuter/less scatological kind was later put together by said Urlesque - Cute Overload picked up on the best:

And as for Facebook, RWD (no, not oor Bob) had this cautionary tale.  Meanwhile, Bob-approved, along came an absolutely stunning trailer for Terry Gilliam's new film, seemingly bursting with imagination and eye-popping sights.  And Tom Waits as the Devil (or God when he's drunk?).  Must be watched in HD!

And just to freakify things further, there was this footage from BBC News of tadpoles feeding off their mum, all a-squiggling and brain-squirmy.  Sometimes nature looks awfully unnatural.

There's another fabbo trailer here for Legion, starring the ever-splendid Paul Bettany as a machine-gun-wielding angel who's sliced his wings off.  All sorts of nastiness ensues - could be ace, could be sub-Underworld/Blade/Constantine mince.  Worth keeping peepers on.

Also on films, Roger Ebert's posted his review of Miyazaki's Ponyo.  As if I wasn't desperate enough to see it, he writes this:

There is a word to describe “Ponyo,” and that word is magical. This poetic, visually breathtaking work by the greatest of all animators has such deep charm that adults and children will both be touched. It’s wonderful and never even seems to try: It unfolds fantastically. [...] This 68-year-old Japanese master continues to create animation drawn by hand, just as “Snow White” and “Pinocchio” were. There is a fluid, organic quality to his work that exposes the facile efficiency of CGI. And, my God! — his imagination! The film opens with a spellbinding, wordless sequence beneath the sea, showing floating jellyfish and scampering bottom-dwellers. The pastels of this scene make “Ponyo” one of the very rare movies where I want to sit in the front row, to drown in it. This is more than “artistry.” It is art.

And it's not out in the UK until feckin' February!  Aaaaarrrrghhhh!

A friend on Facebook posted this video, two promo's produced for Halo 3 back in October 2007.  Why the relevance?  Well, the director went on to make District 9, released in the US this weekend and twatted GI Joe off the top of the charts.  If it's anything like this in quality, it should be a huge treat.

After all that noise, relax with this interesting piece on the accidental art of Google Street View.  Strangely fascinating - and so is the music of the Cardiacs which has somehow managed to completely pass me by for the last 32 years until last week when Marc Riley played Dirty Boy near the end of a show and blew my little mind, jaw-dropped for the first time in yonks.  I've since been trying to hear as much of their stuff as possible, not particularly easy when they're not on iTunes, Emusic or any other legit MP3 store and almost all albums apparently out of print.  Still, I have my ways, and what I've heard so far is ace - the influence on Blur is obvious, but Cardiacs are far more interesting, restless, wonky, thrilling to my old ears... bless you, Lard, bless you.  Here's a Cardiacs track from 1988, which certainly looks the age and has that 80's 4AD sound, particularly a lovely slab of guitar heaven towards the end.

To wrap up the week, Sully's stand-ins posted this wonderfully odd CG animation, deliciously French, melding Pixar quality with Magritte surreality.  Enjoy!

Muzorama from Muzorama Team on Vimeo.

I Think You Deserve A Lovely Party

Last wedding post, honest - all about the music played over the whole day (and cracking vids of some of them).  If you were there and wondered what the deuce that awful racket was while you were trying to have a conversation, now you can find out!

I began thinking about what music to have at the wedding on pretty much the same day I proposed, way back in January 2008, and didn't completely nail down the playing order until 48 hours before the wedding itself. During this time it went through all sorts of changes - the above notes are just a glimpse, as I tried to compress a wishlist of songs totalling 22 hours into less than half that time. This was made all the harder by regularly hearing new music that just had to be in there, the latest example being Daniel Johnston's session recording of Go for Marc Riley that I heard the week of the wedding and spent an evening hurtling around the internet trying to find an MP3 of that particular version (and then, when not finding one, ripping it myself using iRecordMusic). It became a regular occurrence in our flat for me to suddenly yelp out "this'd be great for the evening!", scamper around iTunes to find it then figure out how to crowbar it into a playlist already 4 hours too long, running tracks and orders past my better half.

In the end I think we did okay. Obviously, it's not just a list of stuff I like - there's a chronic lack of Torche and Melt Banana on there - but music the Missus loves as much and also won't repel our guests. Well, the penultimate track might have lyrically, but that was at the end of the night anyway. Ironically, after all the time and thought put into choosing and ordering the songs, the first hour or so were completely missed as everybody was outside for photos and I hadn't arranged for the outdoor speaker to be brought out, being somewhat dizzy, which was mildly annoying as we'd picked some of our very favourites for that first hour and Loudon Wainwright's Passion Play is just perfect for a wedding. A cursory glance over the afternoon list shows a fair few tracks plucked from the Tighten Up! Trojan Reggae Classics (1968 - 1974) compilation, which I'd always thought would help keep the atmosphere relaxed and breezy, and from Alton Ellis, king of rocksteady/lover's rock, whose music I'd never heard until late 2008 when Mark Lamarr highlighted his work, particularly the swoonsome Willow Tree. You can get his excellent Be True To Yourself Anthology at iTunes (bizarrely subtitled 'The Godfather of Lover's Book') for £11, which at 56 tracks is pretty sweet.

Similarly, the evening playlist ended a few songs early because we were getting far too tired, only a few people were left and it seemed best to go out on Thank You For The Music - and oh, by Jove, it was, the seven remaining people in a circle bellowing along to the chorus. Having never DJ'd or anything close before, I wasn't sure quite when people would start dancing - turned out to be later than I expected, which I think was down to an expectation that Missus & me would start the dancing as is customary, when as far as we were concerned we didn't think we'd be dancing at all that night, especially with my gammy leg. Obviously, as the photos show, we eventually did get up and move our feet (or, in my case, upper body), but we were just too bally shy to do so earlier. I partly wish I'd made a few changes to the playlist over the course of the evening, replacing the comparatively harsh Pump Up The Volume/What Time Is Love double bill with something a bit more poppy , but the day was going so quickly and there were so many people to talk to, I didn't want to lose even a few minutes hunched over the iBook moving tracks about.

Still, it's a good bunch of songs, two playlists we'll always keep on iTunes or whatever the future equivalent is. Even though I hardly noticed a lot of the music on the day, such was the overload of it all, it must've sunk in somewhere because playing any of it takes me right back to the Book Trust or Marlins Wynd, some to the point of choking up a tad (Bjork's Unison, I'm looking at you, even though you went unheard on the day! (and if you like that song, do watch the live version below, it's a stunner)) or grinning like a bastard. Now, two months on, if I could just stop hearing music and thinking "ooh, that'd be great for the evening"...

(See below for the full tracklisting and some ace videos to go with it)

Classic Gold, Nagl Style

We interrupt your normal blog-reading for three words from the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion.

BELLBOTTOMS!

WAIL!

BLOOOZE!

Ahhh.  I needed that.

Sounds Like Summer

"No matter how down you are you'll eventually rise..."

Every summer, particularly around our annual holiday, I seem to latch onto a particular album or EP that ends up the unofficial musical touchstone for memories of that summer.  Previously there's been Boards of Canada's The Campfire Headphase, Mr Scruff's Keep It Unreal (Every time I hear Fish I can practically see the water lapping against the stone jetties at Stromness) and Air France's blissful No Way Down EP from last year, released on Swedish label Sincerely Yours.  Skip to this year and this post from Gorilla Vs Bear, highlighting a new release on said label from an artist only known as JJ, describing the music as "summer jams of the dreamily wisftul, blood-spattered variety".  Could be good, thinks I, and have a listen to one of the tracks (available for free here, or just click play below).

Lovely!  Suitably sold, I popped over to the online store to buy the album whole, 9 tracks at a nicely priced £5.40, and already it's shaping up to be the album that soundtracks the sunnier moments of this summer (though it is facing some serious competition for playtime from the new Engineers and Phoenix albums, both of which are excellent and deserve proper reviews later, while the second album from the Gentleman Losers is currently noodling and brooding around my ears most pleasantly).  As with Air France, it catches that blissed-out sun-bleached timeless feeling of a good summer, rather than the hi-energy trance bollocks you get blasting out of cars.  Think Grouper on the beach, St. Etienne via Air France with a sprinkling of Paul Simon's Graceland and whale sex noises. If there was the slightest scrap of justice in this vicious universe, From Africa To Malaga would be the summer anthem, rather than fecking Bonkers.

Always, Always, Always The Sea

Do you like free music? Then pop over to British Sea Power where you can download a lovely remix of Carrion/All In It by Pressbutton. It's quite a rich mix of dreamy layers, soothing and floaty - the original of Carrion is just as lush, you can watch the video for it here. I really should listen to more of that band - their most recent album is a cracker, their merchandise includes mugs ("British Tea Power") and t-shirts celebrating Scapa Flow, and last month they released a DVD/CD of the 1934 film Man of Aran with a new soundtrack by themselves. I've not bought it yet - financially rather sore after the wedding & honeymoon, especially with plans to move house soon, more on that later - but the below clip from it promises lovely things and a fine evocation of real sea power in sound and film. Click play and let yourself be swept away for a few minutes.

You Can't Do That On MP3 Volume Three

These vinyl beauties flew over the Atlantic a few weeks ago from Robotic Empire, being the two albums and one EP produced thus far by the wonderful wonderful Torche, they of last year's best album and posts passim. The above are a gorgeous example of why vinyl is never going to completely die out, not while there are bands and designers with the desire to produce artwork and packaging as fitting to the music as this (and consumers like me who'll fork out moolah for the finished product). Here's a video for Across The Shields from that highlight of 2008, Meanderthal, which might as well be called Where The Wild Things Went. Four freaky looking creatures scamper around a hazy summer wood - but what happens when they meet? It's a great evocation of the sheer joy of loud heavy music like Torche, confident enough to not even bother with any of that grouchy doomy cliched harumphing that most metal bands go for. Nuts to that - let's have fun!

(Cheers to Crustcake for spotting the video)

The Elbow Patented Goosebump Generator

Watch/play the following, and if you don't get a delightful shiver at that bit (you'll know it when you hear it) then, strewth, check your pulse or something.

Taken from the excellent Elbow at Abbey Road CD/DVD, wherein that there band plays The Seldom Seen Kid in its entirety with a little help from the BBC Concert Orchestra and über-choir Chantage.  It was recorded back in January this year and gives some already-brilliant songs a greater depth, emotional weight and all round wallop.  Previously available from Elbow's site, it's now up for sale at HMV and really should be snapped up by anyone with the original album.  Me, I reckon it's the definitive way to hear TSSK, a super-rare example of a live recording improving on the original, especially as the DVD is in lovely 5.1 surround sound for that what-the-deuce-are-they-doing-in-my-living-room feeling.

08: Music!

Finally. Right, let's start with my favourite album of 2008 and bumble around from there. (Incidentally, if you're reading this on a RSS reader, you might not get the music players embedded into the post - if so, just come on over!)

"Meanderthal" (Torche)

ALBUM OF THE YEAR!  Why? Because it's SO FUCKING GOOD. Responsible for one of the best live performances in this or any other year, Torche brought it all together with this album, a blistering combination of power rock riffage and full-on sludge doom clobber. A collection of absolutely thrilling music that bounds from one track to the next, riff after riff of spirit-lifting glory, ending with the most bum-trembling track I've ever heard. And then you play it all over again. And again. And again. My LastFM stats should attest to that. Topping it all off, the gatefold design for the vinyl pressing of Meanderthal is bloody lovely. If you don't have this album yet and have even the slightest interest in rock music, you really need to rectify the situation. Just to hammer that home, listen to the triumphant Across The Shields. As a soundtrack for charging headlong into an epoch-shattering battle against demonic hordes, it's easily the equal of Achilles' Last Stand. Heresy? Truth! AVAST!

"Is It the Sea" - Bonnie "Prince" Billy. Blethered on about this before - a recording of the gig he did in Edinburgh with Harem Scarem back in 2006. Absolutely magic, far better than the downright middling new release Lie Down In The Light, even with the inexplicable lack of I See A Darkness. Hooray for the internet! (iTunes)

"Third" - Portishead. Also blethered about already. Sounded great initially and it's just got better over the months. We Carry On and The Rip are two of the best tracks this year - you can listen to the swoonsome latter below. There's not a duff track on the whole album and I'm now pretty much convinced it's Portishead's best album. While others yelped themselves hoarse over Chinese Democracy, this was the comeback of the year. (iTunes)

"Dragging a Dead Deer Up a Hill" - Grouper

Time for things to get a little odd. I only heard this in December, but it ended up getting played daily every evening for at least a fortnight. Strange ethereal music, acoustic guitar reverb and distant vocals, it's what parts of Goldfrapp's splendid Seventh Tree would have sounded like if they'd got lost in the woods and never found their way home. Have a listen to the blissful When We Fall below. It's gorgeous music, curious but not sinister, perfect for cold long nights and hazy summer days alike. (iTunes) (Emusic)

"Book of Norma" - Norma

What's this, an album unavailable in physical form here in the UK? Indeed, and if it wasn't for reading Scandinavian music blog It's A Trap I would have never even heard of this band. Norma are a Swedish four-piece (singing in English) who released their first EP - catchily titled 1 - in 2007, which I picked up after comparisons with Aerial and My Bloody Valentine. A year later and out came 'Book of Norma', their debut album. It's a brilliant piece of work, full of variety, confidence and energy. Comparisons? There's a splendid Krautrock feel to the relentless rhythm of the faster tracks - it would be worth learning to drive solely to be able to barrel down a motorway one night with Evelyn or You Go, We Follow pounding from the speakers - while slower numbers have echoes of a stripped-down Spiritualized, a more intimate Engineers. Or you could just listen to 'Waste' below (and download it here). It's such a good album, yet you'd never heard of it but for the internet (unless you're Swedish). Well, now you have, so there's no excuse. Though there's no physical UK release to speak of, you can buy it digitally from iTunes, Emusic or Kliktrack.

"London Zoo" - The Bug

Angry album. Very angry album. The Bug's previous album, Pressure, was narked enough, but things have gone downhill since then. London Zoo triggers similar emotions as Burial's Untrue from last year, but while that album felt like a journey through London, seen through the window of a moving car, London Zoo slams you straight down in the middle of an inner city hell and doesn't plan on letting you leave any time soon. It's a startling album that demands your attention with the meatiest beats of the year and barrage after barrage of lyrics that rail against politicians, suicide bombers, "all them fucking people that think charity begins at home / believe me, nothing begins at home". If anger is an energy, London Zoo could keep the capital running for years. (iTunes) (Emusic)

"Laulu Laakson Kukista" - Paavoharju

Another odd one, this. If Grouper is the sound of getting lost in a forest one hazy summer day, Paavoharju is the sound of still being lost as the sun goes down, the wind picks up and you start to catch glimpses of people in animal masks through the trees. Uneasy listening, if you like. A Finnish band, Paavoharju would make the ideal soundtrack for The Wicker Man if it were relocated to a Scandinavian island, their music inhabiting some strange place between Boards of Canada, Bonnie Prince Billy and Bjork (and no, I wasn't just staring at the 'B' shelves). This is a genuinely fascinating album, all the more so for the strangely alien atmosphere that pervades both pumped-up dance beats and an acoustic guitar ballad, keening female vocals and ultrasound squelches. Lest the above make it sound like a curio, the strangeness is easily matched by the melodies, rhythms and atmosphere, songs that you can go back to over and over, trying to take it all in, to absorb it, to decode. You could try falling asleep to it, but there's no telling what you'd dream of... (iTunes) (Emusic)

And for some more summarised reviews, otherwise this could go on for sodding ever:

"Hercules and Love Affair" - Hercules & Love Affair - A supremely funky piece of work, sincerely groovy, the full length version of Blind an absolute treat to behold and one of the songs of the year.

"Mega Breakfast" - The Chap - A great dollop of wry fun, the sound of hedge fund bankers before it all went sour, such a treat to hear well-spoken vocals. On top of that, Proper Rock really did rock. CLUBBING!

"CSI: Ambleside" - Half Man Half Biscuit - HMHB's best album yet, with songs you wish Peel had been around to hear. Took Problem Chimp To The Ideal Home Show does exactly what it says on the tin, while National Shite Day may as well be the new national anthem.

"Fleet Foxes" - Fleet Foxes - As good as everyone says, remarkably.

"Accelerate" - R.E.M. - The album I always hoped they still had in them, and by Jove they delivered. Such a treat to get walloped round the head with this perfectly titled album of music that barely stops for breath.

"No Way Down Ep" - Air France - The sound of summer and early autumn, a perfectly-formed EP of sun-kissed melodies and pure happiness.

"The Seldom Seen Kid" - Elbow - Bloody great to see them finally get some solid recognition - a brilliant set of songs, but you knew that already.

"Death of a Typographer" - Byetone - One of the best electronica albums of the year, taut crisp beats that caught my lugholes while waiting for Radiohead.

"Devotion" - Beach House - Only just caught this at the end of the year, but what a treat. Deceptively simple songs, soothing, like a warm cuddle by the seaside.

"This Is It and I Am It and You Are It and So Is That and He Is It and She Is It and It Is It and That Is That" - Marnie Stern - Vies with Torche for the best riffs this year, juxtaposed with the poppiest of voices. And when the drums barge into that first track - awesome.

There's a whole bunch of albums from last year I'm still getting into - Bon Iver, Made Out Of Babies, Deerhunter - which would probably make the list if only I had more time, but with only a few hours left in January it's time to get this up and turn to the sounds of 2009. Still, if there's anything you think is sorely lacking from the above list, do let me know, it's always a pleasure to be pointed in the direction of good tunes.

As for this year - the highlight so far? A toss-up between Bon Iver's sublime Blood Bank and Mastodon's triumphant return to planet Earth with Divinations (complete with frikkin' laser beams!), both of which please me in very different ways. But which is better? There's only one way to find out!

Converting Sound Into Electricity Into Bits Into Sound

I'm gradually getting back into the swing of things after a few weeks of various railroad shenanigans - expect to hear soon about Northampton, London, Brussels and my Night of the Idiot Tax. First up, though, there's Shellac.

Long-time readers (there's got to be one out there) might remember my enthusiastic yelping back in 2004 about seeing Shellac playing (twice) at All Tomorrow's Parties. Not only that, I'd had the pleasure of their onstage company two years before when they curated a full ATP, the memories of which remain immensely fond and loud. Fast forward by four years, and you've got them touring after their fourth album proper released last year, Excellent Italian Greyhound. It's a strange album, certainly not as immediate as the previous 1000 Hurts, with a couple of especially tense and unsettling numbers - anyone else feel unclean after playing A Real Lullabelle all the way through? - but it's a grower for the right frame of mind. And while they sound perfectly good recorded - make that seriously fucking good recorded - ever since I first saw them in 2002 I've felt they were a live band first, recording artistes distant second.

No wonder then that I've been psyched for months about Shellac playing the ABC Glasgow. On a practical level, the nice high ceiling at that venue guaranteed there'd be none of the stuffy heady air that makes my lungs constrict and my head spin, while the gig was bound to wrap up at a reasonable hour, pretty important for someone coming over from Edinburgh on a Sunday night. The icing on the cake was going to the gig with the illustrious illustrative Brothers Dunn, Rob and Gordon, both long-time Albini aficionados (that imaginary long-time reader will know Rob as Albini's Bitch in comments of yesteryear) who'd yet to see Shellac in concert. Expectations were immense, but I knew they wouldn't be failed.

For a band that plays so relatively rarely, Shellac are a remarkably tight band, tuned into each other on stage with a precision I've only seen a couple of times elsewhere. With two of the band members top-drawer record engineers, they've an ear for good sound and the excellent equipment and acoustics of the ABC responded wonderfully to them. When they came onstage I was startled to see that they'd all got younger by at least a decade since 2004, surely a testament to the health benefits of a life of Rock. Their show followed a similar drill to previous times - no projections, no encore, a Q&A session (during which one audience member confused Bob Weston with the compliment that his bass playing was "braw") and the final song ending with the piece-by-piece dismantling of the drum set. And, as with previous times, they were absolutely fucking MINT.

Hell, this was the best I've ever seen them, a band absolutely tuned in to each other, playing off against each other musically and verbally, creating an almighty sound that never degenerated into unfocused noise. Brutal, taut, tension and release, raw yet utterly in control. Perhaps surprisingly, given the menacing edge of the music, they're also a genuinely enjoyable band to watch - dare I say fun? It's not just the stage banter, though that's sharp - it's also in the bullet-time dramatic pause mid-song when all three sloooowly lunge backwards in preparation for the next note, drumsticks slo-mo spinning in Trainer's hands (of course, that next note was hit by all three with perfect precision), the freaky plane-shapes during Wingwalker (a definite highlight), Weston teasing the audience with promises of some Big Black numbers, and the aforementioned closing up even while the drummer is still hammering away. It managed the impressive task of being both a powerful show and a genuinely enjoyable one, the good vibes a welcome counterbalance to the tension of some of the songs (Prayer to God, anyone?).

Shellac live was a rare rare treat that left everyone reeling with big grins and ringing ears, as good a gig as you could ever hope to have. To celebrate, here's the first two tracks from their superb live session recorded at Maida Vale on Radio 1 a few years back, dedicated to John Peel - if you'd like the rest of the session, give me a yell.

Ghosts (4.5MB, MP3)

The End of Radio (8.7MB, MP3)