New CDs February 13, 2008

A few new CDs were added to the Hornsby collection over Christmas.

Sol Seppy ‘The Bells of 1 2′: Mrs H-to-be and I saw this band supporting Sparklehorse last year (or was it the year before?) and they upstaged him. I’ve been listening to them on Last FM and have been hooked by a couple of their songs, and thought it would be a good thing to play when friends with more middle-of-the-road tastes come to dinner. It probably is, but I haven’t tried it yet so I can’t say for sure. It hasn’t stood up to much serious solo listening though – it’s a bit too lightweight, and the lyrics are sometimes saccharine-drenched. Some decent pop tunes though, and a singer with a very emotive voice.

Bonnie “Prince” Billy ‘Ask Forgiveness’: My mate Jim gets annoyed with Mr Oldham for messing around too much in between proper studio albums and doing too many cover versions. He’d probably hate this then. It’s an almost solo, acoustic EP. It’s ok I guess, but I’ve tired of it quite quickly. Danzig’s “Am I Demon” and a cover of R Kelly’s “World’s Greatest” are the stand out tracks for me. As always, there is a diverse range of songs on here from many genres. I was interested to see that he’s covered a Bjork song from the film ‘Dancer in the Dark’, but it’s a wee bit dour.

Neil Young ‘Chrome Dreams II’: I had a go at a Guardian critic a little while ago on this blog for his review of this album. He really liked the 18-minute epic ‘Ordinary People’. I think it sucks. It sounds like it was written in his 1980s Reagan-supporting days, and is a tedious, way overlong, stadium rock song. It’s got saxophones and a brass section in it, and not in a good way.  Thankfully, Mr Young redeems himself with many other songs on this album, his best since Greendale.  (I don’t go with the general media view that Living with War and Prairie Wind were good albums).  My particular favourite is his song to his late producer and mentor, David Briggs ‘No Hidden Path’.  Now that has a proper Crazy Horse sound to it, and when you hear it, you know he’s moving closer to the source.

It’s still a couple of weeks until payday, so I’m back onto Last FM and Pandora to get some new tunes.

Ken vs tractors February 12, 2008

It’s rare that I think that a politician has done something brilliant, but London’s Mayor Ken Livingstone is one of those people whom I frequently find myself saying “Well done son” about.  I did it again today when Mayor Ken announced that he would be increasing the London congestion charge from £8 to £25 for high-polluting vehicles.

Listening to the predictable uproar from owners and sellers of such vehicles, I could not help but notice that not one of them was able to justify their stance in anything other than selfish terms.

Excitement in Bexley February 6, 2008

I seem to have strayed away from writing about Bexley, on the whole, but it would be wrong of me to let the “Dezza-gate” affair (as they seem to be calling it around here) pass without comment.  (In case that doesn’t make any sense to you, I’m talking about the recent media scandal caused by my local MP, Derek Conway, paying his sons a rather tidy little salary out of public funds whilst not gathering any evidence of work that they may or may not have done).

Firstly, and on a positive note, my hat goes off to fellow, much more productive Bexley blogger Duncan Borrowman for leading the charge against Mr. Conway.  I wish his campaign every success.

And, well, go on then, hats off to Derek Conway too.  It’s been ages since we’ve had a really decent political sleaze scandal.  The Tories really know how to do it in style.

Portishead do Butlins December 12, 2007

It’s not your standard venue for a rock festival, but those who have been to an All Tomorrow’s Parties leave with a whole new view on holiday camps.

I spent this weekend with three old and very good friends at the Portishead-curated All Tomorrow’s Parties. What a weekend.

Within hours of being out from under the guiding (some might say restraining) hands of our better halves, and upon discovering that Russell Brand had named named his first venture into the world of literature “My Booky Wook”, we were compiling a list of “people who can feck off”. Great to be back with some like-minded cynics.

The festival clips are being uploaded as-I-write onto YouTube, and I’m sure that will carry on for a few more days yet. My current favourite, embedded here, shows what went on in the smoker’s shelter for several hours on Saturday night.

Our top three acts of the weekend were Thurston Moore, Portishead and Chrome Hoof.

We were surprised about Thurston, I have to say. After Sonic Youth’s show this time last year (which was also top-notch), we had expected him to show up and give us an hour and a half of loud feedback, just to even things out a bit. He played it straight down the line, and we were bowled over by how good he and his band were.

Portishead, playing for the first time in ten years, were as stunning as you would expect them to be. A big comeback from them next year.

Chrome Hoof can be hard to describe, but I’ll try: it’s kind of Death Metal Disco Psychadelic Funk played by silver wizards with Shirley Bassey on vocals.

Sorry to say (Andrew) that Sparklehorse wasn’t up to much again. I’ve seen him do a much better show. And Jerry Sadowitz (who doesn’t want to be reviewed, but I don’t care) disappointed 5000 people by switching to play at the smallest venue possible, thus allowing only about 400 people to see his show. I don’t think there are any clips of him having a tug on stage, but I think this image is now permanently available in the mind of one of my work colleagues.

Poem of the weekend goes to John Cooper Clarke, who had us reciting hire car all the way home in our, well, hire car. Sounds a bit like Jimmy Saville, but what a hell of a guy.

Honourable mentions also to Black Mountain, Jah Shaka, Aphex Twin and Kling Klang. Anyone else who was pretty good – apologies, I probably wasn’t there.

Whilst wandering past a noticeboard, I noticed (that’s the point of noticeboards surely?) that “The Catford Scum” were there. Google says that “Catford scum does not match any documents”, but I’d be delighted to find out who the Catford scum are, and perhaps even meet them someday.

We’ve come back wondering, after a little too much flavoured vodka and pickled eggs, if it’s possible to have black pepper poisoning?

(Edited slightly on 4 Feb 08, to remove my ill-thought out potty-mouthing.  I don’t want this site to have an adult content label slapped on it, thank you very much.)

Lewisham blogger’s meet up December 3, 2007

I had a very enjoyable evening with the Lewisham bloggers on Friday – an evening organised by Andrew.

After several pints of Proper Job (highly recommended) I made some, possibly foolish, promises about my future work at Greenwich.  (All in good spirit, you understand,  and only things that will improve the reputation of the council if I deliver them).  I’m not going to repeat those promises here – those you of that heard them, and remember them, can remind me if you think I’m slipping.  That’ll teach me to make promises when in beer.

A really good night all-in-all, where, as a newcomer, I was made to feel very welcome.

Neil Young November 26, 2007

A review by a Guardian music critic that is a shining example of why I don’t read the Guardian any more. (I find the news in the paper excellent, but their music and culture writers suck big time. ) This piece is just lazy, inaccurate journalism, from the paper that brought us headlines such as “Why we all love Robbie Williams”. ><

Farewell to Lewisham November 26, 2007

I’ve got a new job at the London Borough of Greenwich, and will be joining them in a couple of week’s time. So, it’s farewell to Lewisham for me, for the time being. Farewell to the physical world of Lewisham that is, as I hope that I will still have good relations with its blogosphere.

Lewisham has been a good place to work, I don’t mind saying. It’s well organised, and as an organisation, it knows where it is going, and what it is trying to achieve. I certainly felt that it was clear what I was expected to do to achieve those aims.

There are some fabulous people there: some real characters, some incredibly talented people, some hard workers (who I am always in awe of) and some who have been just really good to share an office with. (Plus some who are a mixture of all of these).

Not everything is perfect, and there are times when I didn’t like some things about the job – but you’ve got to expect that wherever you go, haven’t you?

For my part, I think I’ve left the parts of their website that I looked after in much better shape than before; I’ve helped to solve many technical issues; and I’ve certainly been able to make many suggestions on the strategy for improving and maintaining the site. It’s to Lewisham’s credit that senior managers do actually listen to us groundlings (sometimes).

Honesty October 29, 2007

Full marks to the chap at Costcutter in Bexley Village, who today gave me back the £20 with which I dozily overpaid for my shopping last night, following a five hour drive back from up North.

Neither he nor I noticed me handing over said extra £20 note, but thanks to a till check and his honesty,  the chaps from Costcutter now have a spotless reputation in our house.

I’d wanted to write to Costcutter head office to compliment him, but he insisted that it wasn’t necessary (so I still don’t know his name). Instead, sir, I’ll pass on my thanks here.

Keeping it Peel (well done Auntie II) October 15, 2007

My second thumbs up for Auntie Beeb is for the recent ‘Keeping it Peel’ show, hosted by Elijah Wood, which formed part of Radio 1’s 40th birthday celebrations.

I wondered just what kind of a job Mr Frodo-sir would make of this, but he did a pretty good job by saying his piece and then keeping the hell out of it.

I also suspected that the show would be made up of the usual collection of fawning megastars and insincere DJs all falling over each other to say how often they listened to his show, and how they actually really like death metal, with music from the Smiths, the Sex Pistols, a token Fall song yawn yawn yaaaaaawn.

There was a bit of the above to keep a wider range of punters happy (and I’m always happy to hear a Fall song) but there was also something of the spirit of John about the show, which made me wonder whether one or two of his old producers, or even some of his family, had been involved in it.
I think that this show must’ve been an incredibly difficult thing to put together since you’ve got to try and achieve the balance of musical integrity and limited commercial success that was the hallmark of most of the stuff that he played. Of course, the producers of the show were helped by having access to what is probably a huge archive of John’s ramblings in audio. And it certainly was great to hear him ramble once again.

When I first started to listen to Peel, I found it hard work, and I only did it because I somehow felt that it would be good for me – somewhat like reading Dickens. I wanted to hear the bands that I liked, and I didn’t have much time for the other stuff – and there was so much other stuff.

I don’t know at what point that changed, but I do know that his show became a real joy to listen too, and that he changed my attitude to music completely, over the years. In fact, I hold him partly responsible for the fact that when my friends come round to dinner they complain like hell about the music that I play and ask me what planet I am on (a fair question).

Internet radio such as Pandora and Last FM are pretty good for finding new music, but I can’t see them ever changing the way I think or making me laugh quite as much as John did. I find it sad to think that if he were here today, the fact that his show had been pushed to an unfeasibly late slot in the schedules wouldn’t have mattered to his listeners, who could ‘listen again’ whenever they wanted to. (I’m sure the old boy himself would have continued to be very disgruntled at being kept up late, though).

Anyway, with John Peel day having passed last Thursday, I thought it high time to put it on the record: I miss John Peel so damn much.

Cameron attacks ‘phoney’ Brown October 10, 2007

David Cameron has said that Gordon Brown looks like a phoney, and that he is treating people like fools.

He’s got a bit of a nerve hasn’t he?