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.)

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”. ><

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.

Eleven cover versions September 17, 2007

In response to Andrew’s list of twenty.

In no particular order:

• Cat Power – Wonderwall *(Oasis)
• Kid Koala – Moon River (Andy Williams)
  
• Tortoise and Bonnie “Prince” Billy – Pancho (Don Williams)
• Coldcut/Irresistible Force – Autumn Leaves * (Nat King Cole)
• Barry Adamson – A fantasy bond theme (MontyNorman) **
• This Mortal Coil – Song to the Siren (Tim Buckley)
• In the Country – In my time of need (Ryan Adams)
• TV on the Radio – Mr Grieves (The Pixies)
• The Pixies – Winterlong (Neil Young)
• Nirvana – The Man who Sold the World (David Bowie)
• The Fall – Lost in Music (Sister Sledge)

Any more than eleven and I would be scraping the barrel.

*These two were pretty hard to find on the web, so this is the best I can do. The Cat Power track was from a stunning Peel session in 2000, and isn’t available to buy.

**I can’t find this one anywhere, which is a real shame. It’s a ska version of the Bond theme, and is well worth hearing if you ever get the chance.

Don’t Look Back: Slint August 29, 2007

All Tomorrow’s Parties’ Don’t Look Back season kicked off recently, and I was determined not to let it pass me by this year. The Don’t Look Back deal is that bands come along and play their best album, from start to finish.

I went along on my Jack (having an odd taste in music means I occasionally need/want to do this) and had a rare old time. It was my first visit to this particular venue: Koko in Camden. I have to say I was impressed. Lots of little cubby holes to sit down in, to have a pint and a chat in, and watch the band too.

Support was from Alexander Tucker. I’ve seen, and enjoyed, him before. He’s a solo artist who seems to record short sections of himself singing, playing guitar or playing violin, before playing back those recordings on a loop. Each song builds up into a crescendo of interlacing sounds, and rhythms and harmonies start to appear. It’s like, way out, man.

Slint were there to play their 1991 album, Spiderland. It’s considered a highly influential classic these days, though I am not ashamed to admit that I had never heard of them or this album until about four years ago. They certainly mixed in the right circles in their day: Will Oldham took the photograph used on the cover of the album, Steve Albini produced their previous album, and PJ Harvey allegedly applied to be their singer.

I’ve been listening to the album for the last couple of months, and seeing it played live really brought it to life for me. It’s a dark and serious album, and a dark and serious gig, but it’s got so much variety in it: the fact that the first song is about a rollercoaster ride says a hell of a lot about what follows.

The band are curious performers: very static and reserved in their stage presence, yet unleashing powerful waves of sound with pinpoint precision. Nobody seems to have put a clip of the gig on YouTube yet, but I’ve found a clip of them at the Primavera festival in Barcelona, if you want to see them do their thing.

Only one person seriously tried to dance.