Star Wars video mash ups are all very well and good but now for the serious stuff that matters. I’ll be playing some tunes at this on Saturday, please visit this link for more details about how you can help, what is needed and what isn’t. You can drop donations at Glasshouse and they will be distributed to those who need them, have a clear out and help make a difference.
Music
Obsolete formats: I have no way to play these first few items and already own them in several other forms but I couldn’t resist picking these up today.
The ‘…Pelham 123’ release is a Video disc in a huge plastic ‘cartridge’, bigger than an LP, I originally thought this was the same as the Laser disc system but it seems it’s an earlier, failed format that was read with a physical needle rather than a laser! – more info here.
I was amazed that the Derek & Clive release was even on 8-Track – this one almost as dirty as the audio it contains. The Curtis Mayfield cart is just a beautiful object.
This is Toolshed‘s first ever release from 15 years ago, a 2 track 7″ in a ziplock bag with screen-printed, folded card cover. Toolshed is Graham Massey‘s occasional all-star experimental supergroup featuring the likes of Paddy Steer, Seaming To and many more.
‘Punk Funk’ was my favourite track from The Brotherhood‘s Elementalz album back in the mid 90s and I never even knew this existed on 7″. With a great heavy remix by 12 Rounds (who included Atticus Ross among their members) exclusive to this format it’s probably my favourite find of the day. This particular version is not on YouTube so you’ll have to take my word for it.
Finally found this Psychedelic Furs 7″ with a flexi stuck to the cover, play the sleeve as well as the 45 inside!
This Jona Lewie single is actually only 6″s in size and includes a funny little disclaimer about the realities of automatic turntables trying to play it. Stiff Records up to their old tricks again, strange that they should do a 6″ and a 7″? This one was bought purely for its odd format and joins the tiny ranks of my irregular-sized vinyl collection.
From the seemingly bottomless archives of the Future Sound of London‘s tape cupboard comes vol. 8 in their From The Archives series, 12 tracks from unspecified times that never made the cut. As well as this new release there are now vinyl versions of earlier volumes of their more ambient Environments series, complete with Buggy G. Riphead sleeves. You can preview one track from Archived 8 below and get CDs, downloads and vinyl from their FSOLdigital online store where they also have posters and T-shirts. Also you get an extra exclusive 3-track digital EP if you order from there too.
New Yppah album, Tiny Place, out next month on Counter – preview two tracks here.
Out today, Ollie Teeba‘s first solo album, a LONG time in the making, finally here and it’s a banger. Check out this snippets mix, full of cameos from the likes of Jean Gray, Ghettosocks, the Soundsci crew of course… full of quality tunes with a Darrell Krum cover to boot. Get a copy here, very limited vinyl.
UPDATE: – Digital now online HERE
Techno DJ Colin Faver has died, best known for his Abstract Dance radio show and club night, Knowledge. His and Colin Dale‘s shows on a Monday and Tuesday night on KISS FM in the early 90s were essential listening. It was there that I first heard the Aphex Twin and the emerging UK electronica scene amongst all the other great Hardcore and rave tunes. A pioneer.
Some lovely designs popping up on Andy Votel‘s twitter feed for festival appearances this summer, hope Jane tours that Belladonna rescore. There are still a load of radio shows I need to catch up with over on their Soundcloud.
Wish this was real, not sure who it was created by as I found it via Dave Taylor on Facebook and he didn’t know either so please leave a comment if you know as I can’t tell from the signature – there are a few good ones floating around the web including this one below by Paul Hostetler. UPDATE: the image above is by French artist Obion.
Here’s my new 45 Live image by Paul Trewin aka Sub2 – he’s certainly captured the likeness even if I do look a bit serious. Check his work out here and see the whole 45 Live roster below (including new member Jon More from Coldcut). There the start of a new night in Plymouth on the 26th of this month too with myself, Boca 45, Pete Issac and Francois Parker if you’re in the area. There’s be a new mix from me next week to go with it…
A new record from Ghost Box is always a cause for celebration on this blog but this next one is actually celebrating their 10th anniversary so congratulations are in order. It’s a double album of highlights from the back catalogue on CD and LP with thirty one re-mastered tracks, heavy with The Advisory Circle, The Focus Group and Belbury Poly as you would expect. Graphic design as ever is by Julian House and extensive sleeve notes are by music writer, Simon Reynolds (who coined the term ‘Hauntology’).
Only one track is new – from the forthcoming Hintermass album – and you can hear clips from the compilation here. They promise a double CD with booklet or gatefold LP with DL code. Available on 9th October 2015, (pre-orders in the Ghost Box shop from 19th September). I’m really looking forward to listening to this in one sitting, from one of the most consistent labels out there and a constant inspiration.
My article on The Dragons is in issue #49 of Shindig! Magazine – out now, 6 pages too. New interviews with Doug & Dennis Dragon plus Donn Landee who produced their BFI album. After their recent publisher troubles the mag is back and as good as ever, you should be able to find it in most WH Smiths and decent record shops. If the article piques your interest and you want to hear the music they made then Ninja Tune still has digital and CDs in stock although the vinyl is long gone.
If any of you have young children you’ll probably be familiar with Minecraft, the computer game where you can build whole worlds and adventure around without all the usual shoot ’em up, dodge the obstacles, collect the gems and battle the boss-type things (although you can do all that too if you want). It’s like virtual Lego and each self-generating land is populated by all manner of creatures who each have their own quirks. I always remark on the music when my kids are playing it, a collection of short, ambient piano pieces which remind of Satie, Eno or Budd and makes for a refreshing change from the usual repetitive manic mayhem associated with most games.
Now the soundtrack – by Daniel Rosenfeld aka C418 – has been released on vinyl and CD by Ghostly International, or the first volume has anyway – subtitled ‘Alpha’. Vinyl fiends take note: the first run of the LP (1000 copies) comes in transparent green after which is switches to black and the sleeve is a lenticular version of the graphic above. It’s available digitally for just $4 from C418‘s Bandcamp page which has previews of all tracks and the second volume, ‘Beta’, follows at some point in the future.
Pretty much the best quality version of the animated intro from the 2 hour + The Grateful Dead Movie from 1977 I can find on the web. It was created by Gary Gutierrez who “had already apprenticed at John Korty’s Mill Valley studio as an animator of children’s films, creating and directing live action and animation for “Sesame Street” and “The Electric Company,” before working on the Dead’s animated sequence. He continued working withe band on various projects of theirs, including the surreal title sequence for the CBS revival of “The Twilight Zone” television series (1985), for which (Jerry) Garcia composed the score.” *
* Info from www.nightflight.com
UPDATE: There’s a good minute of the intro in very high quality over on Vimeo on the trailer for the film.
The fabulous Jane Weaver has a new digital single out in the form of ‘Mission Desire’, one of my favourite tracks from last year’s album, ‘The Silver Globe’. Check the video for it above too, featuring French cartoon Marie Mathematique which serves as a trailer of sorts to a forthcoming DVD on Finders Keepers. There will be a split 7″ arriving soon shared with another Bird artist: Cardiff’s Tender Prey.
Also just released and already on the turntable is an offshoot recording, ‘Neotantrik Globes’ – teased at the end of ‘The Amber Light’ 2xCD extended album. It’s a 1-sided LP with an ambient collage recorded live late last year by Andy Votel, Suzanne Ciani, Sean Canty and featuring Jane’s vocals and other parts from the record.
Delia Derbyshire‘s radio programmes with Barry Bermange from the mid 60s are great works of wonder, forward thinking and as relevant today as 50 years ago. Until now I was only aware of ‘The Dreams’ – an unnerving 5 part exploration of various themes people experience in dreams set to Delia’s dark ambient soundscapes. But earlier today I discovered there are actually four separate programmes, created in 1964 and ’65, on the subjects of God, The Afterlife and Growing Old.
Here is the second ‘Invention for Radio’ as the pieces are known, ‘Amor Dei: Vision of God’, a four-parter that pits believers against non-believers to show two sides of people’s perceptions of God and worship. Each is set against a minimalist soundtrack, choral and calming – an incredible work, originally created for BBC Radio 3. There’s more info on delia-derbyshire.net with links to the other inventions as well as pretty much anything else you want to know about her work.
Part 2.
Part.3
Part 4.
I’ve been away for the last four days at Camp Bestival with the family but it looks like biggest news of the weekend is this monster. The Rammellzee ‘Cosmic Flush’ project just gets better and better and is shaping up to be release of the year if it continues like this. Here’s the blurb: “Part 4 in Rammellzee‘s Cosmic Flush project brings together Doze Green and Edan, two heavyweights who need no introduction. Pre-orders are now live, limited to 500 copies with 250 signed print editions.”
An absolute gem of an album recently surfaced on Trunk Records – ‘Galactic Nightmare’, a kind of low budget War of the Worlds first released on cassette in 1986 and now transferred to a double vinyl album with gatefold sleeve, printed inners and extra art. There’s a nice story behind it on the Trunk website and I love that GN logo above – so 80s. Only 500 copies on double vinyl, sold out on the label website but they have digital if that’ll do you. A real special one-off as only Trunk can do, look out for it, here’s a short preview…
A brand new album of material by John Baker from the BBC Radiophonic Workshop is getting a release on Buried Treasure next month. You may remember me featuring their Rare Psych, Moog & Brass comp over a year ago that I’m still playing tracks out from.
From the press release: “Whilst producing ‘The John Baker Tapes’ albums for Trunk Records, Alan Gubby – Buried Treasure’s label manager – unearthed several reels of music & sound effects from the 1960’s BBC TV series ‘Vendetta’ – an organised crime / mafia thriller starring Italian actor Stelio Candelli (Barbarella, Django, Planet Of The Vampires). John produced a tense, rhythmic & unhinged James Bond style score for the 1st series in 1966 featuring live drums, radiophonic bass lines, taped atmospherics & screaming jazz improvisations.
Available for the 1st time ever, The Vendetta Tapes displays Baker’s legendary skills in combining tape manipulation with live instrumentation. The music is thrilling, sleazy, deranged & very hip. Highlights from the score are presented on this compilation alongside other previously unreleased tracks plus a couple of classics from the hard to find Trunk compilations – all digitally remastered by Mark Ayres from the radiophonic archives.”
Released on LP, CD on the 14th August 2015 via Modulor Distribution (Paris) but you can buy the digital right now from the BT bandcamp page. Unfortunately all CD & vinyl copies have already been swallowed up by the stores such as Rough Trade or Norman Records so hit the links to pre-order.
Just saw Love & Mercy – utterly fantastic in so many ways. The casting was superb, the music (both real and recreated) was spot on, the attention to detail between the time periods right on the money. It moved me to tears several times and their portrayal of the injustice Brian Wilson suffered without resorting to sensationalism was admirable. A big hand should also go to Atticus Ross for his amazing sound collages that use snippets of Beach Boys songs and studio outtakes to form mood montages throughout the film, let’s hope they get an official release at some point.
Paul Dano as a young Brian – superb, Paul Giamatti‘s Dr Landy was terrific and Jake Abel WAS Mike Love. John Cusack as the older Wilson wasn’t facially convincing but he got the mannerisms down although that half of the film was more about Landy’s battle with Melinda Ledbetter anyway. As a hardcore Beach Boys fan who’s read the books (official or otherwise) and waded through the bootleg sessions, it got the tone pitch perfect.
Here’s a late 80s oddity that I was turned onto recently by Steve Cook – he of Secret Oranges fame. A 1988 Acid House 12″ made by the late, great Brett Ewins among others that comes with an 8pg B&W ‘lyric sheet’ featuring the art of Brendan McCarthy, Steve Dillon, Jamie Hewlett, Shaky Kane, Philip Bond, Jamie Hewlett and more.
The tracks themselves are primitive attempts to make Acid House (without the aid of the all-important Roland 303 by the sound of it) but have a period charm to them. Brett intones creepily over the top of the A side sounding like a riled up Timothy Leary on speed. The B side houses two instrumental cuts with ‘The Church of Acid’ coming on like Bam Bam with a sledgehammer and there IS a snatch of 303 but it sounds sampled and slightly out of time.
‘Dr. Microdot’ is a shorter version of same with the addition of an unidentified voice asking you to relax (we’ve all been there) and both tracks suffer from a lack of a decent arrangement, stumbling along with samples and effects being randomly thrown in and out of the mix. I’m being unkind but it’s fair to say they haven’t aged well although the fact that they were made in the middle of the second summer of love gives them a certain kudos. I’m wondering if the Ken Thomas credited with producing this fascinating artifact is the same one who has worked with everyone from Queen to the Cocteau‘s?
There’s even a video for a shorter version of the A side featuring Brett spouting his gobbledegook lyrics.
The artwork is the gold here and the free comic is basically of lot of the early gang of artists responsible for Deadline taking a page each and letting rip with whatever they feel is appropriate. Brendan, Philip and Shaky come up with some crackers but I’m not sure where Jamie’s contribution is exactly unless he collaborated with someone and isn’t credited. Ron Merlin, an early Deadline character, makes an appearance but it’s not clear if he is supposed to be the voice on the A side. There’s very little about it on the web but I love these musical comic crossovers (the Madness off-shoot ‘Mutants of Mega City One’ is another) even if the sounds often play second fiddle to the artwork.
