Saturday 30 July 2011

Amyville & The Eastern European Beggar



All quite here in Amyville (as my borough, Camden, how now been renamed). I cycled past the sacred site this morning on the way to the supermarket since it’s just ‘round the corner, and there was only one person outside Her house, sitting in a fold-up chair as if he’d been there all night, and he probably had. On the way back more had gathered to pay their respects and lay wreaths/beer cans/fag butts/bouffant wigs and no doubt other items which they perceive to contain the essence of Amy. I also spotted what looked like a marrow...perhaps Amy liked marrow. Things I’ve heard whilst passing the house over the last week: ‘I’m not broken-hearted today’, ‘I’m not well’, and ‘Nice ‘ouse, innit?’. The media, meanwhile, seems to have deserted the scene, although they’ll no doubt return when the monument is unveiled in Camden Square gardens. The strangest site was of a little girl (about five years old) laying flowers whilst watched over by her mother, I mean, after all, a drug-addled, wealthy, boozed-up singer who blew it all is a fine role-model for tiny tots, eh? Not that I condemn her for her lifestyle. I’m simply baffled that children are involved in this at all.


I was sat outside a cafe in Crouch End having a coffee when a man in his 50s stopped, pointed at my pouch of Golden Virginia, and asked for a roll-up. He had an Eastern European accent, was smiling, and didn’t smell. I let him have one. Not because he didn’t smell, or was Eastern European but, yes, partly because he smiled and asked so politely. It’s obvious that Eastern Europeans are gradually moving into the fag-cadging game; not content with having successfully infiltrated building/plumbing etc. I presume that Eastern Europeans who fail here, being unable to afford tickets home, will appear more frequently as cadgers on the streets.
   Soon British-born down-at-heel types will be complaining that ‘The Poles have taken our jobs’. In a way, it serves them right for frequently being rude when asking for money or fags. They might get their act together and raise their game now they’ve got competition. Watch out for a new, improved, more polite kind of beggar near you soon.

Friday 29 July 2011

Memories In Vibration - A Mix feat Ennio Morricone, Delia Derbyshire and More


I’m virtually a DJ, doing a virtual mix – my first, so forgive the volume variations in places. It was a strange experience for an old-timer like me who can remember picking up those black shiny things and laying them on actual turntables. Whilst this was fun to do, finding the tunes in my online library was a lot more time-consuming than flicking through a box, of course; a box which I would have already loaded with what I wanted to play. On the plus side, nobody came up and asked me to play ‘Something I know’. Or worse, such as the time a girl asked me for ‘something funky’ whilst the JBs were playing – a true story. No floor to fill in this case either, and whilst that was a joy when I succeeded, the freedom of compiling music to listen to is a great pleasure too. In case you’re unfamiliar with some of the names, it’s an early-electronic...library...jazzy...beat...experimental...er...funky kind of thing. 
  


Listen Hear

Wednesday 27 July 2011

Life (...it eats you up) - Mika Vainio



If  we must have guitars in modern music (and people do persist in using them, don’t they?) let them sound like this – like a grinding tool – like...total overload...not like guitars normally sound...unless they sound like this in Doom Metal, which I’m guessing they might do, although genres such as Black/Doom/Death/Hell Metal might feature singers, and as you know, I only like singers from 1983 back. I saw someone in a Black Sabbath t-shirt yesterday. I wanted to stop him and say ‘That’s not big, or clever, or even ironic, twat’. But what can you do? By the album title you might guess this isn’t a jolly affair, or even a normally up and downbeat affair, although it does consist of various textures and therefore is not wall-to-wall (of) noise. Not quite. I’m listening to it for the first time and the builders on both sides of The Bunker are joining in now and then, on drills – it adds to the experience, as if they’re ‘jamming’ with Mika. They can’t compete, though. I wonder if they can hear through the open door, and think ‘He’s making a racket, we’ll show him’. There’s a cover of The Stooge’s ‘Open Up And Bleed’ here, which is like a screwed take, vocals slowed down to a monstrous growl – Iggy would approve, surely. I may not play this too often, but listening now, it feels like the best possible response to lightweight Pop, talent shows, Lady Gaga, silence, tabloid newspapers, TV ad songs, people who buy tabloids, the Olympics, the ‘arts’ coverage on BBC London News, the guy wearing a Black Sabbath t-shirt, celebrity wreath-layers, adults who buy Harry Potter books, and anything/one else that pisses me off. It’s that powerful.


Saturday 23 July 2011

Blade Runner Reading Material - L.A. 2019


Tom Southwell spent six months creating background graphics (signs, posters, neon) for Blade Runner, but only had four days to knock up some magazine covers, which were simply Xeroxed and stuck on existing titles such as Omni and Playboy. According to Southwell, Scott 'simply wanted a fuzzy visual backdrop for the newsstand', hence the crudity of the designs. Real content shaped the cover content, obviously. Since they were rough to begin with, 'Kill Weekly' could not be improved on when scanning, unfortunately. 'Horn' is the funniest of the bunch, for obvious reasons - 'Hot Lust In Space' and 'Scratch & Sniff Centerspread'! These were scanned from the American magazine, 'Cinefantastique' (Vol 12 No 5, 1982). The in-depth feature on Blade Runner contains a lot of interesting material, which I may scan in the future.







Friday 22 July 2011

Gli Occhi Freddi Della Paura (Cold Eyes Of Fear) - Ennio Morricone



Listen Hear

So this morning a friend asked what I’d been listening to recently and I said, amongst other things, Ennio Morricone, and he mentioned a covers album of his spag Western tunes by someone, so I told him other material by Ennio excited me much more, and I mentioned this soundtrack from 1971. He hadn’t heard of it, of course (the chances were slim). Ennio’s tied to his famous Western themes in popular culture, which is no bad thing since they are so good, but here’s a soundtrack I want to shout about from the rooftops. Hold on...right, I’m up here...THIS ALBUM IS ABSOLUTELY AMAZING! Perhaps no-one’s listening. I hope you are. This features  Gruppo di Improvvisazione Nuova Consonanza. It’s like, er, psychedelic Jazz; the best you’ve ever heard. It’s electro-acoustic. There are even a few walking double bass lines, like a nod to the tradition, and when this element crops up it’s as if they’re also acknowledging the Cool Jazz Soundtrack school. But only in bursts, because otherwise they’re busy creating perfect improvised miniatures as mood music for a psychotic slasher flic nightmare.

Thursday 21 July 2011

Facets EP - Miles
















That's Miles Whittaker of Demdike Stare. This is a new EP by him. You can buy it here. It's good. Rough. Noisy. Caustic. Music for post-industrial modernists.

Wednesday 20 July 2011

'Flame Out' Tracklisting.


The 'Flame Out' comp is now available as a download. Listen hear.

1. ?
2. ?
3. Spillane (excerpt) – John Zorn
4. Sitting Target – Stanley Myers
5. Transport – Moebius
6. Cleanliness and Order – Boyd Rice/Daniel Miller
7. ?
8. Cello concerto – Bach
9. Last Tango In Paris – Gato Barbieri
10. ?
11. Flame Out – 101 Strings
12. Bloody Pom Poms - ?
13. Locked grooves
14. ?
15. What’s Wrong? (from ‘THX1133) – Walter Murch
16. Sirius B – Heliocentrics
17. Willie Nelson – Miles Davis
18. ?
19. Shock – Libra
20. du pop a lane (excerpt) – Bernard Parmegiani
21. Steve Allen
22. Deja Vu – Mort Garson
23. ?
24. The School Bus (from ‘Dirty Harry’) – Lalo Schifrin
25. Happy Trails -

Question marks represent samples that would take too much time to describe.

Ramblin'

Mm, yes, RAMBLIN’ (and ranting) is what I’m about to do, so if the thought of that horrifies you, click away now. Otherwise, stick around and along the way you’ll learn some FASCINATING facts, such as: YOUR BRAIN STOPPED GROWING WHEN YOU WERE 18. So I read. But how that can be a fact is a mystery to me because I thought everyone developed differently with small or large variations. Not that I know anything about biology. My brain stopped growing when I was 8 – FACT!
   According to Encyclopedia.com (Ornette) ‘Coleman hit a financial low point around 1980, living in a series of unheated apartments and cheap hotel rooms, and suffering two robbery attempts in an abandoned Manhattan school that he tried to turn into an arts center. After one of those attempts, he was left for dead by teenagers who had attacked him with a hammer.’ Can you imagine that?! Where are those teenagers now? Do they know they nearly killed one of the great musicians of the 20th century? They must have thought he was just another bum. But he rose, phoenix-like, yes, from the ashes of his own desperate condition, and towards the end of the decade was in fine shape, playing with his new band, Prime Time, at London’s Town & Country Club, where I watched in awe with the woman I would go on to share my life with ever since. There, a personal biographical fact for you.
   But this blog is not so much about my personal life, as you may well know. And whilst I’m on the subject, thank you for reading, looking, listening. Yes, you. Perhaps you’re a first-time visitor. If so, look around. You’ll find all kinds of interesting things. Honest. That’s not a plea, it’s a promise. Unless you’re not interested in my artwork, graphics from magazines, exclusive scans from books, film reviews, album reviews, LP downloads, book reviews, essays...and so on. Your time won’t be wasted, whereas I could be wasting mine right now, talking to myself. I talked to a fellow blogger an hour ago and we joked about our viewing stats in relation to the music press. I said ‘I don’t want to set the world on fire, just start a little flame in the hearts of readers who enjoy my site’ (paraphrasing an old song) – and it’s true. If I was stat-hungry, I’d have starved long ago. He raised the point that many mainstream newspaper music journos probably have private educations, y’know, the old (posh) school tie fraternity. I don’t know about that, but I’m sure their CVs were brimming with fascinating, important facts that got them the job, such as working on the Dalston Gazette for three years as a junior sub-tea-maker writing reviews of Indie gigs and albums. I live fairly close to where The Guardian’s offices are, I should go ask them. I should walk in and say ‘Where’s your music editor?’ Then say ‘How many cunts working for you went to posh schools? ‘Cause they ain’t worth shit!’ Before throwing a foam pie in his face.
   So there’s a gaping hole in the lives of News Of The World readers – to match the one between their ears. 1.6 million (roughly) morons without their weekly fix of shit. Well, they can easily get that elsewhere. If I was a member of the enquiry team yesterday I’d have asked ‘How come you preside over an empire that peddles puerile crap in the form of tabloids which serve to KEEP THE PROLES STUPID instead of acting responsibly and raising the intellectual, spiritual, and cultural aspirations of your readership by adhering to the notion that GIVING THE PEOPLE WHAT THEY WANT is the way forward, the way to improve the health of the nation? Eh?’ I’d like to have seen Murdoch Jnr answer that one.
   On that note. I bid you farewell. TTFN



Tuesday 19 July 2011

The Sexploiters - Petra Christian (1973)


Instead of dedicating the novel to her parents, husband, editor, God or whoever, Petra wrote: 'For fame and recognition - which might turn out to be a drag!' Indeed.

 

Monday 18 July 2011

Maschine Mensch - Fritz Kahn Illustrated


Images used for Fritz Kahn's work. I've tried to include ones that don't appear to be on the 'net already. For a brief biography see here.


 



 

 

Sunday 17 July 2011

The Reporter & Mister Buddwing - Kenyon Hopkins



Two more gems from Kenyon Hopkins. If you like Jazzy, sophisticated soundtracks, these are essential.


The Reporter,1964   Listen Hear



















Mister Buddwing, 1966 Listen Hear

Thursday 7 July 2011

Kulchur An' All That



 Culture is the arts elevated to a set of beliefs.

                                                     - Thomas Wolfe

Yes, I use the quote on my sidebar, but I’ve the notion that nowadays ‘culture’ is seen as a free-for-all rather than some elevated phenomenon – what do I mean, ‘the notion’, it’s fact. Kenneth Clark isn’t explaining civilisation on the box to tweedy pipe-smokers and tweedy pipe-smokers no longer inhabit TV studios discussing ‘culture’ – although, as I think I’ve said before, I’d actually welcome the return of snooty culture to the idiot box. Sure, we have The Culture Show, and that’s all well and good up to a point, the point being that they still miss out on the opportunity to discuss fantastic music/film/literature, which translates as Things I Love. And Mark Kermode winds me up. And musically they’re so retarded. At this point I should state that we only have five channels, and whilst BBC’s iPlayer allows for catch-up sessions, I’m still old-fashioned enough to believe that Culture should be covered more in the terrestrial transmissions.
   But whose Culture? Everything is Culture now, from soaps, to ‘reality’ TV...and ‘Coast’ (Countryside Culture is big on the Beeb, and I’d rather that than ‘Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner’, thanks). Yes, Culture...ah...the Greeks...Renaissance Art...Classical Music...but there is more, so much more, of course, and before you know it you’re forced into an either/or position, which is wrong. Sadly, the old High/Lowbrow debate of the 90s saw many falling into that trap, the one of having to defend Dylan as a ‘real’ poet and pit him against Shelley, or the Teletubbies against Tolstoy (I don’t think that ever happened, actually). Either/or is typical of our class-bound society. You’re ‘educated’ or ‘thick’, ‘posh’ or ‘prole’ and so on. In the race to categorise everyone, there are too many losers, and besides that, too little thought given to actually studying what people are like and how their cultural choices may vary. Whilst generalisations often contain truths, we all know how dangerous they can be. All us of, that is, except idiots born in council houses.
   Years ago I wrote about Culture As Religion, and yes, I know it wasn’t a new idea then. In the absence of God, what do we ‘believe’ in? Consumer culture has made many of us into people who actually believe in what we buy, as symbols of our inner selves. This was most strongly felt regarding music when you bought a record. You can’t put your arms around an MP3. I recall walking the town with an album under my arm, not in a bag, signalling what kind of fellow I was. Isn’t that how Keith Richards and Jagger met? Today this is no longer possible. We display a penchant for music, locked into the private world of the MP3 player, without revealing what we actually adore. This is a good thing, probably, because if it were possible to display what we were playing (I’m imagining a projected playlist screened on our clothing) I might go on a killing spree.
   Remember going into a friend’s room and looking at their books and records? How revealing it all was. Perhaps you would spot a surprise, a record they might have done better to hide. But that surprise served to remind you that, yes, like you, they’re human after all, rather than a walking manifestation of Perfect Taste. And there was the thrill of seeing things that you also possess and cherish. The equivalent now is posting clips on the social network, I suppose, although that lacks the truly personal aspect of entering someone’s physical domain, of course. Some people, I note, do spend a lot of time posting their cultural signifiers; I mean an awful lot of time. Most of them live in the Outer Hebrides. This is good, though, technology allowing them to connect.
   So I’m sat around chatting with friends the other day, all of whom happened to have got this far without worshipping, or being desperate to acquire, all the common consumer items which symbolise Success in our wonderful society. No, they’re not commune-dwelling anarcho-hippies (as if I’d let that smelly bunch into my house!), just living for something other than all that. It felt good to share this attitude, although none of us, I’m sure, would turn down a cool million and everything it would buy. But there’s the rub. I’ve only got to where I am today (lowly material status) by being clueless career-wise, ‘uneducated’, and lazy, it’s true. And yet, I still believe in Art and Creativity as a more sound basis for Belief than just buying Stuff. You know the stuff...stuff that represents nothing more than your ability to afford it. I think the other stuff does enrich lives, and more people would benefit from getting it, just as they would benefit from finding their creative selves.
   One of those friends got into The Bunker. I watched him like a hawk, fearful that he might try and pocket my Olympia Press ‘Soft Machine’, ‘The Third Mind’, or worse still, one of the few remaining copies of ‘Points Of Departure’ (ha-ha). I’d protect some of my possessions as fiercely as others would their costly homes. I like to think they’re actually worth more although, sadly, together they wouldn’t fetch as much as a three-bedroomed house. If they did, I guess that would be a true test of my devotion to Culture, wouldn’t it?


Tuesday 5 July 2011

The Strange One & The Hustler - Kenyon Hopkins


I was going to write a long piece explaining the meaning of our existence in a modern world seemingly bereft of belief and purpose other than to idolise material wealth and download as much music as possible but I got waylaid by Kenyon Hopkins. Who? Yes, right, a soundtrack composer who scored ‘The Strange One’ (1957) and ‘The Hustler’ (1961). I’ve had ‘The Hustler’ soundtrack for some time but only just got ‘round to really appreciating it – you know how it is. ‘The Strange One’ is new to me, and I’ve digging (as us middle-aged hep cats say) that very much. The artwork suggests it’s an adaptation of a Genet novel, but a quick look tells me it’s not, although it does apparently have ‘homoerotic undertones’, so there is a link. You know I have big eyes for Tevis’s novel, ‘The Hustler’, and the film, naturally, because aside from anything else, I still believe Newman to be cooler than  his arch rival in the silver screen heartthrob stakes, McQueen. Both soundtracks are brilliant in just the way you want soundtracks to be from this period; jazzy, top draw arrangements. ‘The Strange One' belies its time with some greasy R&B swingers included.



Listen Hear


Listen Hear


Monday 4 July 2011

Invasion Of The Mysteron Killer Sounds



I wonder if Kevin Martin owns a pit bull. I bet he does, he’s very street, y’know...the difference between him and most other pit bull-owners being that he knows who Stockhausen was.
   This compilation has two great titles: ‘Electro Agony In Dub’ and ‘No False Hair’. The former contains the sound of breaking glass and, like Nick Lowe, I love that, on a record, not reality. In reality, in pubs, it usually meant trouble. But what have Firehouse Crew got against wigs? Surely a terrible comb-over is worse. Then again, a dodgy rug is no better than a bald-‘ead.
   I went to a reggae sound clash once, as the (only) white man in Aylesbury Civic Centre circa 1978. Well, someone had to represent the hip face of honkies in a hick town. It was filled with dreads in military gear, and my insides are still recovering from the bass tremors – what a great night.
   One of my favourite rhythms here is on ‘Them Can’t Hold Yuh Gal’ by Parara and McCoy because it’s so stripped down, as is Team Shadatek’s ‘Yoga Rhythm’, proving that less can be more. By contrast, The Bug tries to blow your brains out with ‘Aktion Dub’, and will probably succeed.
   Fira’s ‘Hummer Version’ nicks the ‘Halloween’ soundtrack piano motif, and it’s one of the best tracks here for being more subtle rhythmically, if not exactly refined in sample choice.
   This is the voice of ‘The Mysterons’. The real ones threatened to destroy the city of London. Younger buyers of this album probably don’t know that. Captain Scarlet was a must-see for me when I was a kid. In the absence of YouTube clips from the album, here’s the great opening from that series.

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