Formed by Simon Raymonde and Robin Guthrie after their disappointement following their disappointmens with their treatment by 4 AD. A complex, claystrophobic company, Eventually Ratminde took sole charge at the helm of Bella Union.They're an inspirational, diverse record label
Senegals' Orchestra Baobab. An operative that began from gatherings of Dakar givernment iffucials. Together they make a joyous, spiritual, organic sound.
Highly odd. Much of this comes across as if you're stuck in a lift in Lost Of Translation and this is playing on loop.
'Strange brew. Kill what's inside of you.'
New York based Singer - Songwriter Stewart Bronaugh taps into universal feelings of loneliness, anxiety romance and isolation on Lionlimb's new album Limbo.What more could you hope for in these troubled times.
It's a murky and mysterious record as you might expect. Angel Olsen comes and joins him on 'Dream Of You.' but there's penty else to recommend the project and its end product. Bronaugh has a disembodied and not what you'd describe as a strong voice. Given the murkiness of the sound here, a confused and troubled voice actually seems to be precisely what is called for most of the time .
Mixing up a whole set of influences. '70s Italian soundtracks, 60s Girl Group Ballads and Funk and Soul Classics.' {prtishead and David Lynch. The overall effect is not unlike ordering yourself a dish you don't fully understand when you're in an Asian restaurant and getting a bowl full of thick, forbidding soup.
Solids swimming in muddy liquid dumped in front of you some tume later. Best get your head down ,keep mum and tuck in if you know what's good for you. I find myself returning to this.I realised just now that Limbo is a highly appropriate description of what's going on here. It's suspended. Anyhow the results ar highly intriguing.
Few labels have had such a broad and lasting impact on R & B, soul, jazz, rock an pop as Atlantic Records, founded by Ahmet Records, founded by Ahmet Ertegun and Herb Abramson in New York in 1947.
By 2005 Roddy Frame was no longer Azrec Camera. Well of course he was always Aztec Camera. A brilliant artist who made it to the stars Surf is a fantastic record from middle age which illustrates exactly what was always so exceptional about the man and his talent. He's a perfect alchemy of head, heart and breathtaking technique. .
'Eldritch house. With green moss..'
Wonderful and Frightening is spot on. Full of wonder and terror. This comes from 1984 and they're very much Mark E. Smith's ship now. I wouldn't generally listen to The Fall first thing in the morning. They seem more suited to the Midnight Hour. But today I found this quite bracing while my bath ran. Like an early shift Gym workout with unfit and unruly types whose tracksuits bottoms kept slipping down. I didn't do the whole seventy minute routine I confess.
Browsing through the postings in social media yesterday afternoon, I came upon one from Shinding which directed me to Amelia Coburn. A remarkable young artist with a distinctive Northern brogue and a vivid and thrilling vision.
Listen to her debut album Between The Moon & The Milkman. I did yesterday..First drawn in by the Shindig prod to a couple of tracks. Later in the same evening. not convinced by a Netflix film that had toyed with my affections but not won me over I went back to my desk, put my headphones back on and dove deeper into the album.
It's a fascinating record and she's a brilliant artist. She plays a ukulele and let's face it, this has hardly been an in vogue musical instrument since George Formby put his own down several decades ago and probably was hardly all the rage even back then.
Coburn's a performer with a touching emotive voice with thoughtful intonation patterns. This is a record that an enormous amount of wor./ Care and love are key ingredients. I love stumbling across artistic endeavours such as this one, I get the impression that she knows her Jacques Brel and her Jake Thakray. Her Disney and Hollywood musicals.. Her Scott Walker. David Bowie and Edith Piaf. Also crucially herself.
She knows what she loves. She has her own guiding stars. But she's not for a moment overawed by them. This is a fantastic first step on what could be a Fantastic Voyage . It will be wonderful watching wherever she goes next. In the meantime this is one of the most exceptional and inspiring records I've heard this year,
The Beatles. The Beatles represent innocence primarily for me. With Love as your shield and sword. Not the whole story of course because Lennon particylarly was an unholy mix of cynicism and innocence. Apple was the moment they threw off Sgt. Pepper suits and put on business suits.
'Starting from zero, got nothing to lose.'
This albu. sold a ridiculous amount of copies in the UK when it came out in 1988. It felt like it was Number One in the album charts for the best part of six months. These songs remain instantly familiar, but no worse for that if you ration your plays. I listened again this morning and was struck again by the minimal beauty and stark courage of these songs. It can still move.
Came out at a time when I wasn't really sure what a Gay Man was. I was an incredibly innocent youth. So this record talks about a world I had no idea existed.. It's a document of the mundane and the pull of desire into the subterranean urban underworld. Soft Cell ruled the single charts for a couple of years from 1981 to 1983. They were invariably Top 3.
Endorsed by Stewart Lee, and erm It Starts with a Birthstone Silver Biiplanes continue their helium fuelled flight across the heavenly horizons with latest album Travelling By Candlelight.
It takes off pretty much where 2023's A Moment In The Sun left off. in fact it would be fairly fair to say that if you're not a member of the taylor's guild yourself you may not be able to detect the join .
This will go down with anyone who doesn't blanch at the description indiekids. Who probably have frst edition Postcard singles or Talulah Gish badges stored in a trunk in the attic for that rainy day. In the meantime they should cup an ear to this Motirilk neets C-86 wonder. A thing of beauty
Another band from the clearly blossoming Oakland Califirnia music scene. Yeah- Ming & the Rumours I Can't Have It All is a quite lucious leftfield Pop album, somewhere between The early Beatles, the early Lovin' Spoonful and the early Velvet Underground if they had abandoned any pretence of wanting to write seedy dirges about S&M, prostitution and mainlining heroin and sing songs about falling in love that their mothers might like instead.
Let Mo Tucker sing half of their songs and Nico to sing the other half providing she made an effort to sing in tune under threat of packing her back off to Cologne otherwise an made her wonder whether she still had Federico Fellini's telephone number somewhere among her leather and syringes.
This is an utterly charming, unpretentious record. Yeah Ming occasionally throws the F word in to show she's not to be messed with, even though she sounds as if she's really sweet as apple pie. The Rumours meanwhile play it straight, inhabiting a world where it's always 1965, which given the way the world has gone since, might not be exactly the worst idea.
Altogether this is a record and band that lays down its and their cards down right from the off. If you're won over the first track you'll be in love by the time Side B runs off unto its run out groove. Yea-Ming & the Rumours come on like Wes Anderton's wettest dream, This is an album that plays to uts own rules and instincts. I wish more people made records like this.
Punk Rock Eighties label with Grunge associations. Dave Grohl talks about record labels like this in hallowed tones.
I'm always happy to come upon a Deerhunter album and get the opportunity of listening to them. They're explorers in the best sense of the word. Theirs is a chaotic vision that occasionally comes into clarity with incredible purpose. Monomania came out in 2013 and found them halfway between the darkness and the light. Halcyon Digest is possibly the closet realisation of their vision if you want a list, but there's plenty to feast on here.
The kind of record and artist it's always a pleasure to come across. With some of the timeless quality of Tim Hardin, Nick Drake, Cat Stevens Richard Thompson, Tim Buckley or any of your own personal favourite singer songwriter's of times gone by ,
Bill McKay works out of Chicago although the textured murmurings of his latest album Locust Land, are much more pastiral and rural than urban in terms of the atmosphere they evoke.Bucolic. The primary distinctive quality and allure of the record seems to be its warmth and depth.
Switching at will between instrumental pieces and songs that he sings, showcasing his thick timbred voice. An altogether charming and resonant abum to spend half an hour with, It's like coming upon a rare jewel. Fabelhaft!
Formed in San Francisco in 1978 by Jello Biafra and East Bay Ray. Home of East Coast Punk. Flipper, Black Flag, Dead Kennedys and Bad Brains were on the roster,
I've always really liked the idea of The Yardbirds. One of my favourite ovie scenes is the one in Blow Up where the David Hemmings character finds himself in a club witnessing the band igniting one of their rave ups onstage. Jeff Beck smashing his guitar. They just look like a fantastic live experience. Their best records capture that frazzled, ferocious energy.
I'm listening to an album called Light Sleeper by an artist called Bess Arwell. The opening song of the recird is called Evertone Who Iy Not In Love Wuth You is Wrong. It is an expression of beauty and positivity an strength. It is a great way to start the working week.
Atwell stares at the camera on the sleeve of the record with a shy determination. I get the impression that she's a fighter. According to her bio she grew up on the English countrysidde, one of four children from an eclectic familly of artists, songwriters and artists.
Her bio tells of her story of struggle. Struggle is an important element of life's journey. Little of value seems to come without it. Light Sleeper is a recor worth listening to. We can be inspired by others struggle and ability to ascend to the surface of the lake and make their way to the shore. If others can do it so can we.
One of the best artist friendly record labels. The Flying Burrito Brothers. The Carpenters. Supertramp. Joe Cocker. The Police.
A mid career, amiable and likeable Evertthing But The Girl record.
It's Brucie. Brucie, Brucie, Brucie ! I love The Boss. And not just because I share his first name but because he's great. He's got a great heart. A great soul. A great band. A great sound. Great politics. And a great vision.He could have been a writer. But he chose to be a Rock & Roll star. And he's one of the best there's been.
Respect to the guy. He's still performing well into his seventies. Playing wonderful two or three hour shows to adoring masses. People like my mate Normski who never stops going on about him. I understand why.
This is the record he released after 9/11. Typical Bruce. Typical of hs spirit. Get together. Stand tall. Support each other. Onwards and upwards.Great recird
Bob Dylan still seems to be a major irritant for some people. That's what he set out to do in the first place and has focused his attention on to a large degree ever since. It's amazing how people still manage to get wound up by him. Some one else is better. He can't sing. He's annoying. Well listen to what he's singing. Listen to wgat he's saying. .
I have a handful of Dylan albums.From his golden sixties run mostly. And it was golden. Of course it was. Nobody has written like Dylan. Before or since. He's in a space of his own and rightly so. This is as good a place to start as anywhere. Where he started from.
The kind of highly generuc Shoegaze record that you hear all the time these days. Raised on a diet of Slowdive and Lush it se,s. Southcult find Heaven on a debut album called erm Heaven.
I find it rather odd that a scene that I remember very well and whuch was highly despised, certaunly by the music press at the time, has developed such a life of its own since. It's a strange phenomenon and I imagine would be worth writing about why and how this happened.
In the meanwhile this is a likeable but not really notable six track EP. It will fill your life with generic awe and wonder or perhaps make you want to listen to Pale Saints wondrous Comforts Of Madness instead. I confess that's what I did.
'4AD captures the true spirit of independent art...A parallel universe set in a bewildering maladjusted dreamscape...music for unhappy dreamers...'
The Australian Strokes. Or Libertines. Or Hives. Or whoever you went for when this kind of stuff was Highly In Vogue. Nirvana seemed the most obvious touchstone for where they were coming from. There are still some songs on here that I enjoyed hearing again. But generally you got the impression that the guy was not quite right in his head despite obvious songwriting talent.
I can tell you nothing about Llora by Llora. I've just payed it totally in random fashion by clicking on it on this week's new releases. First track Intl. Discoteque sounds mych more like something from the new relases in mid- 1981, surely the height of this doom laden, synth driven stuff.
It continues in this portentious and faintly ridiculous fashion. The likes of Steve Strange who hailed from some backwater in Wales but refused to admit it because they were born to vamp it up in a gothic castle in Bavaria or better still Transylvania.
This is compete nonsense but sometimes the best things are. Life was surely meant for fun. And this record is primarrily fun driven.
I awake. It's Whitsun Monday. A national holiday in Germany but not here. The fact that it's a national holiday in Germany means I have no online lessons because the two I generally teach are cancelled. German people always seem to be either on holiday, about to embark on one or just back and beginning to dream about the next one. It's an enviable state of affairs. Perhaps other states could take note and make an investment in general happiness. It might just bear fruit for all concerned.
Nevertheless I'm up with the larks. The light always wakes me. We're enjoying an excellent spell of weather in Newcastle where I live. I get up. Listen to some of the records on ascending and descending lists which I document on here to keep me busy. Then I'm off to the gym shortly after eight.
I prefer to get to the gym early. I've found that if I turn up later I sometimes have to suffer loud mouths in the dressing room. Telling me of how much they care for the likes of Trump and Putin. I don't care for loud mouths. Particularly ones who turn the air blue to show off to one another or force their ignorant and laughable right wing opinions on people they share the dressing room with. I'm aware I'm getting old. I'm actually pleased I am. I don't care for Putin. Or Trump for that matter. I don't want to hear about them when I've only come to go to the sauna and plunge pool and to have a chat about amenable matters with others I know and don't know.
I get a couple of good chats with good people this morning. A woman in the sauna who is in Newcaste to pick up her daughter from university and drive her back to Sussex. Chris the train driver who's here before his London run. A bearded tourist from Toronto in the changing room in a Beastie Boys t shirt who's on his way to Whutby this morning and onwards to the Yorkshire Moors.
I was planning to go to a Record Fair at a hotel on the quayside at ten. When I get home I realise it's not until next Monday. My life is like this these days. I shrug. Something for me to do next week after my lessons.
I have a funny morning. I'm in a funny space. A transition phase. Going to the fitness centre much more regularly than I used to. Pushing it hard in the sauna and the plunge pool. On top of that I pop quite a few pills these days. For diabetes and high blood pressure. I'm in my late fifties. I don't imagine I'm that unusual. But they make me drowsy. Today I try to have a nap midday because I think it will do me good. Then can't sleep because I've got too much in my mind.
Anyway. Emily calls. As she's agreed to. Last time we met. Emily is my diabetes nurse.She's about thirty years younger than me But frankly she's hot. I'm sure she wouldn't mind. Anyway we talk through the odd way my changes in medication, lifestyle and exrercise regime are affecting me. After a brief chat she advises me to stop taking the Dapagliflozin. After a rustle through my prescription bag I'm relieved to tell her I haven't been taking them anyway. OK. All's OK. She reminds me that I've got a blood test at the clinic on Wednesday to check my blood sugar levels. We say our goodbyes.
I kid myself that I'm just going to watch it until I've eaten my quiche but of course I watch the whole thing. You can't stop a film like Dazed & Confused in full flow. Show some respect. Then I'm off. Down the slope past the castle and down to the Quayside. A bottle of non alcoholic beer in the Crown Posada while I read a prize possession NME I've just bought from 1985. The first time Michael Stipe and R.E.M. made the cover in 1985. They were my band back then and I still think of them as my band. They're central to my life journey like no other. Like the first girl you fall in love with who really falls in love with you too.
Manc Mick is slumped at the bar in his cups. His beard is out of control. Needs a trim. Every bar needs a wind up wastrel like Manc Mick proppping up its bar. I greet him as I buy my beer. Then say my farewells as I leave. You don't always have to sit down and talk to the likes of Manc Mick every time you see them. It won't be that long before you see them again.
I stroll down the Quayside. It's a glorious day. .The sun's in the heavens and it's hot but not oppressive. The best day of the year I'd say and highly promising in terms of suggesting a few months of plain sailing weather wise. Serene is a word which comes to mind.
I have a bottle of sweet cider in The Tyne and read my Mojo this time. The current issue with Paul Weller on the front looking like a slightly geriatric Mod Dracula. I'm one of those that prefers to stay inside even on sunny days when the Beer Gardens are awash with revellers. I'm a poseur I guess. Or a Velvet Underground fan. Whichever you prefer.
Now I'm at the end of The Quayside. Up into the hills to see if Billy,Chris or Steph are in The Free Trade. They're not so I make my way down the shallow dale to the Ousebourne Valley and then up the stone, mossy stairwell to the doors of The Cumberland Arms.
This place is becoming my spiritual home. I'm here virtually once a week these days. To see a gig or on some other pretence. It's always a pleasure to get here.
Especially as the gig is kicking off. It's a Wandering Oak night, set up by Walter Allison who's pretty much Indie daddy and benefactor in Newcastle and its local vicinity. He's an events organiser. I have no idea whether there's an income or subsidy for this or he just sees it as a public service duty servicing the needs of the indie community like some Francis of Assisi type who happens to like Pavement. I'm just glad that he does what he does and my radar pricks up whenever I see an event he's setting up. They're good value for money and attract the friendliest crowds in Newcastle.
An Attendant Ana are sat at a table in the back room. I saw them play last year at the same venue on the night when Newcastle clobbered Paris Saint Germaine 4-1 in the Champions League. They were fabulous and it was a fabulous gig and night. So I'm back.
I approach their table and gabble my appreciation of them. I tend to gabble enthusiastically when I'm in the company of people I admire. I imagiine I would embarrass my young siter but what are older brothers there for except to embarrass their younger sisters.
Anyhow I tell them I think they're great. I like what they do and appreciate how they do it without being sure how it is that they do what they do. They beam at my happiness and praise and I don't bother them further. Upstairs the indie people are gathering. A substantial crowd 40 or 50 I'd say. without being a sell out gig.
I take my beer to a stool at the back of the room and sit through the first act. Sarah Johnsone. She''s a talented musician with a range of well written, emotive songs that don't enthuse me sufficiently to get on my feet and shake my wobbling bits.
The secind act Being Dead are quite a different matter. A whacky Austin Texan threepiece, their album from last year When Horses Would Run was the kind of record that would have Melody Maker journalists frothing at the mouth when I was just a lad. Back in the days when R.E.M. swept everything before them between 1983 and 1985 and brought no end of whacky rootin and tootin alternative and vaguely C&W independent bands in their wake.
I'm talking Rank & File, Jason & The Scorchers, Camper Van Beethoven, Let's Active, Method Actors and the like. Being Dead appreciate their zany spirit and are here to reignite the flame. They play a brilliant, earthy, improvised and inspired set. They understand the thrill of B52s harmonised vocals and can do variations of them at the drop of a stetson. I go to the stage to offer them my appreciation at the end of their set. If they ever play near you, be there,. Or be content to be eternally square.
I almost buy a t shirt after their set. But buying stuff is quite a complicated matter for us old folk these days so in the end don't bother. There's another short break in proceedings before the five members of En Attendant Ana gather and are out of their traps and up and running on stage.
I saw them just last year but I'm instantly enchanted again,. I don't generally go and see bands that I've seen recently except if we're talking Jazz Jam suspects but in An Attendant Ana's case as long as they continue putting out such singular product and playing such exceptional sets, I'll carry on shelling out hard earned for the honour of seeing them. They're something else.
They're brilliant. I'm a bit tired so spend a fair bit of time on my stool at my table. But just because I'm not pogoing and screaming my appreciation in poor CSE French doesn't mean I'm not enjoying myself as much as anybody else in the room.
It's magnifique. Pure and simple they take much of what always made Stereolab so enchanting and magical. Stir it up with everything you've always loved about leftfield Gallic Pop and you enjoyed about solving tricky maths equations at school and you've got En Attendant Ana. The girls are sweet and the guys are smart and they make the most melodic captivating sound.
They seem to have lost the stocky guitar dynamo that I thought was a major part of their live appeal ast year but it doesn't seem to have made a bit of difference. They're still powering through the heats and looking fit for a medal when it comes to finals day.
They do a lovely French version of Something Stupid. The number that I always found slighty disconcerting growing up as it was a deeply sexy duet sung by father and daughter Frank and Nancy Sinatra. They throw a few new numbers into the set which auger well for the next album. They're cooking with gas and no mistake and I expect I'll keep blowing my blog trumpet for them as long as they keep being so wonderful.
They even make Walter Allison dance at one point. At least I think he was dancing. he certainly seemed happy. I'm not surprised, so was I. I made my way down the stairs and off into the night for my night bus. Happy as Louis.
I always liked the guitar warmth of Idlewild records. They're a band I associate with warmth and melodic guitar adventuring. I always enjoy what I hear. I'm on home ground here. There essentially guiding star appears to be R.E.M.. My territory.
A blank, forbidding title. I didn't go into this with much relish. Dance geometry was my expectation. And what I experienced. I went back to the Gastr Del Sol record I'd been enjoying not thinking I'd enjoy this ride so much though it clearly had its own hypnotic intensity.
There are worse things to do in life as you wait and prepare for your Friday morningm than to listen to an album of the month from Uncut Magazine. They generally know what they're talking about. Guides.Sherpas.
So this mornung Gastr Del Sol. We Have Dozens of Titles. They're a Post Rock stalwart quartet, steered by Louisville, Kenticky born David Grubbs. Post and Math Rock albums are interesting propositions. It was a movement intent on making new shapes out of established forms.
When I was a teenager a lot of my schoolmates became obsessed with the artwork of MC Escher who definitely seeme d a precursir of the strange, mathematical, concentration at work on records like We Have Dozens of Titles. It has a weird intensity. Much of it sounds like Jazz.
Anyhow I enjoyed listening through to it this morning. It deserves the attention Uncut have just bestowed upon it. It's a record that's there. And you might enjoy listening too.It's largely instrumental. Somehow the scarcity of vocals is irrelevant.The record has calm, poetic resonance.
I find and found Placebo's teenage hysteria rather shrill for my own tastes. It felt good to move on to something slightly more grown up
Contigo, a sleek, elegant and self contained record from Jinte Deprez, singer songwriter of Balthazar. It's elegent, retrauned stuff. Not much sticks demanding another play. But it's smooth an satisfying while it plays.
An extremely odd Georgian art film at the cinema. The announcement of a General Election in a country that has long lost touch with its conscience and wits/ A dark rainy overclouded day led me to put this on. It cheered me up though I didn't drink along with it. The Pogues were one of the true titans of the Eighties music wise. Many pints and shots were had. Snogs and fights were had. 'lend me ten pounds. I'll buy you a drink.'
Poh Poodle Krystal & Toe. An album fromSanta Cruz multi-instumentalist artist Joe Kaplow. He has a skewed perspective that's reminiscent of Kuty Vile in that it's skewed and idiosyncatically melodic and gifted.If slightly downcast occasionally.
The Kurt Vile thing is constantly there, but that factor doesn't get in the way in terms of enjoying this thoroughly.I love Kurt Vile anyhow. There's a lot going on as in all the best works of art and I imagine there's plenty there to divert the curious listener. It certainly worked for me. Ir's Kaplow's third album and is out now on Missing Piece Records. As any jigsaw puzzle completer will tell you, there's nothing quite as satisying as finding the missing piece.
Something for Dolores who was one of the first great Hispanic Hollywood film stars
