random bloggings from 2002 (!)
3rd July: Yes, it has been a while. Apologies for anyone who was awaiting the next instalment. Bigger apologies if you weren't. I've had a few days away, down near Stranraer, which means there's not much to report. I think everything they get there is actualy from Belfast, which means that, for example, they get the Irish Evening Session. More depressing, all the TV news is from Ulster, whch means it's constat religious violence, tension, discussion and general misery. So apart from avoiding telly,have actually had time off from listening to music at all, which should be a good thing as it means I'm all the hungrier for more. Though I'm also now way behind in listening - I reckon there are 20 full-length albums and half as many ep's again, all Scottish and most 'proper' releases, awaiting listening, and review. At least there's some ammo for the radiomagnetic.com shows, the likes of Christ and Scientific Support are right up their street, as is the new Micronesia. Also rising to the top of the pile are the new/forthcomings from Malcolm Middleton and Idlewild, plus some other stuff I can't even talk about (heh).
With the better equipment I have here I can now do webradio more often - there's a link on the front page to listen - and all I need is the bandwidth to do this! To this end I've dumped the messageboard (well, it dumped itself really) and am now trying to find a decent remotely-hosted one.
Anyway, that was a lot about nothing - more of the same to follow, no doubt. (Have just picked up a dozen packages from the PO Box...)
10th June: Am watching a World Cup game as I work - it's on a 2" screen, but I can still see Hugh Dallas clearly. This means that I'm hearing less music this month and am having trouble keeping up, but did see some very interesting stuff on Friday - Isobel Campbell has resurfaced doing a bizarre cello improv with Bill Wells. This was in support of Monica Queen who really does sounds as good live as on recoird, and tRANSELEMENt who were great, as ever. Although the sheer mindblowing ferocity of their live act can't be captured on record, forthcoming album (in an embroidered bag if the can finance it!) - 'Pendletones' comes pretty close. Since reviews are going in The List I can't put them online yet, but you can see the Radar Brothers and High Fidelity/Bozilla reviews, linked from the main page.
Records then - have got the new Paul Westerberg album which is a double, and the acoustic disc surprisingly sounds better than the electric stuff, Must read the sleevenotes, maybe it's classc Replacements tracks or something. Other random musings - the Supernaturals single if it had come out earlier could have been a World Cup single a la Fat Les or something (don't know what the band would think of that). Meanwhile, Roddy Idlewild seems to have developed an Irish accent. Just in time for their final qualifier, I suppose.
6th June: It's quietened down here, I'm plased to say. Am just trying to find a date and venue for the Jockrock awards show (don't worry, you'll be the first to know). Also watching with interest the T-break scuffling open up a bit thanks to an odd selection of bands. Well, odd, as in "I've never heard of them", which maybe isn't really cause for complaint. Certainly, Odeon Beat Club are the only ones I've seen and they're well worthy of going through. The biggest surprise was maybe that Grim Northern Social (oh, I've seen them too) didn't go through last year, when there was really a buzz about them. Ach well, they've certainly worked hard for it. Hmm, I've seen Kain too, come to think of it. And Ex-Tigers, but that was just their Xmas cover of 'Little Donkey' (which was pretty damn great, to be fair). And Major Major are good on record, so here's hoping. Oh, and 1" Volcano have a good demo too... and Ive seen Cannon, they've supposedly improved a lot since last Tbreak.. oh, and I saw Cholo in Perth, they're much better live than on record. Hmm, all this denial of the bands in the lineup must be a deep-rooted psychological thing since some of my favourites never got picked.
Have also bee listening to the Fischersponer albunm a bit. I think that Mark Radcliffe got it almost right when they said "it's rubbish but has a great cover of Wire's 'The 15th". The album's maybe not rubbish, but is very derivative of every 80's electropop band you can think of, and no better than most of them. And 'The 15th' is indeed the best one on there, by a mile.
4th June: Cruiser's first gig last night. I'm sure it'd be immoral or something for me to go into it in great depth , but it went pretty well. More at www.cruiserland.net. This was the first appearance of 'experimental' music in Dunfermline, in the Music Institute (gig moved from the Tiffany Bar due to demand. Our American visitors also played to the crowded hall - Greg Davis giving us some of what is sometimes described as 'glitchcore', and all from a G4 portable. I'm never quite sure how much credibility can be given to a 'live' performance which is completely driven by computer, but the sound he was making went down pretty well with the musicially-oriented members of the audience (although to the bemusement of many others). Davis finished with a Brian Wilson song (the one abouit vegetables) but again, the voccal was sampled, leading to a 'is it Memorex' scenario). Hrvatski was billed as being the more radical of the 2, musically, but I'd say he has as many moments of fractured beauty (© NME, 1983-2002) as those of sonic noise terrorism.
In other news, have een listenuing to the new Guided by Voices album courtesy of AudioGalaxy, in the car up and down to Fife. Not bad. Ain't no 'Alien Lanes', mind you, but what is? Tracks - too many and too long-titled to name - seem to alterate between ok and the stunnning GbV standard. Track 17 goes on for over FOUR MINUTES. Who the hell does Rob Pollard think he is, Peter Gabriel?
3rd June: back to Falkirk, albeit briefly, to see some more acts in a rainy muddy field. Nusa were on when we arrived, quite interesting mix of Gaelic and bagpipes and decks, but they finished with much more traditional stuff (i.e. Runrig-esque). Classic line though: "this one's rather dark and sombre, hope you enjoy it". The Bhundu Boys took a while to warm up but eventually got the crowd livened much more than the Saturday bands. No idea who was in the band (just Rise Kagona left from the original lineup I believe) and the songs were similarly unfamiliar though there might have been a track from 'Shabini'. Despite shoddy sound a very enjoyable set. Transglobal Underground also appeared but despite some interesting sitar-based stuff to start it all went a bit off for me with a mix of world music and an attempt to be contemporary with some rap kinda stuff. Never did find out of they did 'Papua New Guinea'.
2nd June: took a trip to sunny Falkirk along with around 50 other punters to see some bands playing. The Swiss Family Orbison were there - some of them used to be in Danny Wilson, you know - and did that strummy summery thing that they do, only not as catchily. They announced a cover to finish and following a guitar riff that sounded like it might be off 'War Pigs' or something, it turned out to be a metal (well, Gun-metal, ho-ho) version of "Don't You Want Me". Astrid were next and weren't bad though they seemed to be trying out new stuff (probably few of the sparse audience knew them so it didn't matter) but still sounded fine. Snow Patrol appeared next as a 3-piece (apart from keyboards for closing 'Starfighter Pilot' and similarly did a few new ones which were ok, but also 'Black and Blue' and others from the last album. Lots of the set was good but some of the more complex stuff probably needed the extra backing they get on the album as the tunes are maybe too intricate to stand up with just guitars.
Had to leave before the Cosmics and Sir Bob Geldof, sadly...
1st June: Well, everyone else is doing it, so let's give it a try... the blog is apart from anything else supposed to allow me to do quick mentions of what's going on without making them formal reviews with photos and stuff. We shall see...
With the better equipment I have here I can now do webradio more often - there's a link on the front page to listen - and all I need is the bandwidth to do this! To this end I've dumped the messageboard (well, it dumped itself really) and am now trying to find a decent remotely-hosted one.
Anyway, that was a lot about nothing - more of the same to follow, no doubt. (Have just picked up a dozen packages from the PO Box...)
10th June: Am watching a World Cup game as I work - it's on a 2" screen, but I can still see Hugh Dallas clearly. This means that I'm hearing less music this month and am having trouble keeping up, but did see some very interesting stuff on Friday - Isobel Campbell has resurfaced doing a bizarre cello improv with Bill Wells. This was in support of Monica Queen who really does sounds as good live as on recoird, and tRANSELEMENt who were great, as ever. Although the sheer mindblowing ferocity of their live act can't be captured on record, forthcoming album (in an embroidered bag if the can finance it!) - 'Pendletones' comes pretty close. Since reviews are going in The List I can't put them online yet, but you can see the Radar Brothers and High Fidelity/Bozilla reviews, linked from the main page.
Records then - have got the new Paul Westerberg album which is a double, and the acoustic disc surprisingly sounds better than the electric stuff, Must read the sleevenotes, maybe it's classc Replacements tracks or something. Other random musings - the Supernaturals single if it had come out earlier could have been a World Cup single a la Fat Les or something (don't know what the band would think of that). Meanwhile, Roddy Idlewild seems to have developed an Irish accent. Just in time for their final qualifier, I suppose.
6th June: It's quietened down here, I'm plased to say. Am just trying to find a date and venue for the Jockrock awards show (don't worry, you'll be the first to know). Also watching with interest the T-break scuffling open up a bit thanks to an odd selection of bands. Well, odd, as in "I've never heard of them", which maybe isn't really cause for complaint. Certainly, Odeon Beat Club are the only ones I've seen and they're well worthy of going through. The biggest surprise was maybe that Grim Northern Social (oh, I've seen them too) didn't go through last year, when there was really a buzz about them. Ach well, they've certainly worked hard for it. Hmm, I've seen Kain too, come to think of it. And Ex-Tigers, but that was just their Xmas cover of 'Little Donkey' (which was pretty damn great, to be fair). And Major Major are good on record, so here's hoping. Oh, and 1" Volcano have a good demo too... and Ive seen Cannon, they've supposedly improved a lot since last Tbreak.. oh, and I saw Cholo in Perth, they're much better live than on record. Hmm, all this denial of the bands in the lineup must be a deep-rooted psychological thing since some of my favourites never got picked.
Have also bee listening to the Fischersponer albunm a bit. I think that Mark Radcliffe got it almost right when they said "it's rubbish but has a great cover of Wire's 'The 15th". The album's maybe not rubbish, but is very derivative of every 80's electropop band you can think of, and no better than most of them. And 'The 15th' is indeed the best one on there, by a mile.
4th June: Cruiser's first gig last night. I'm sure it'd be immoral or something for me to go into it in great depth , but it went pretty well. More at www.cruiserland.net. This was the first appearance of 'experimental' music in Dunfermline, in the Music Institute (gig moved from the Tiffany Bar due to demand. Our American visitors also played to the crowded hall - Greg Davis giving us some of what is sometimes described as 'glitchcore', and all from a G4 portable. I'm never quite sure how much credibility can be given to a 'live' performance which is completely driven by computer, but the sound he was making went down pretty well with the musicially-oriented members of the audience (although to the bemusement of many others). Davis finished with a Brian Wilson song (the one abouit vegetables) but again, the voccal was sampled, leading to a 'is it Memorex' scenario). Hrvatski was billed as being the more radical of the 2, musically, but I'd say he has as many moments of fractured beauty (© NME, 1983-2002) as those of sonic noise terrorism.
In other news, have een listenuing to the new Guided by Voices album courtesy of AudioGalaxy, in the car up and down to Fife. Not bad. Ain't no 'Alien Lanes', mind you, but what is? Tracks - too many and too long-titled to name - seem to alterate between ok and the stunnning GbV standard. Track 17 goes on for over FOUR MINUTES. Who the hell does Rob Pollard think he is, Peter Gabriel?
3rd June: back to Falkirk, albeit briefly, to see some more acts in a rainy muddy field. Nusa were on when we arrived, quite interesting mix of Gaelic and bagpipes and decks, but they finished with much more traditional stuff (i.e. Runrig-esque). Classic line though: "this one's rather dark and sombre, hope you enjoy it". The Bhundu Boys took a while to warm up but eventually got the crowd livened much more than the Saturday bands. No idea who was in the band (just Rise Kagona left from the original lineup I believe) and the songs were similarly unfamiliar though there might have been a track from 'Shabini'. Despite shoddy sound a very enjoyable set. Transglobal Underground also appeared but despite some interesting sitar-based stuff to start it all went a bit off for me with a mix of world music and an attempt to be contemporary with some rap kinda stuff. Never did find out of they did 'Papua New Guinea'.
2nd June: took a trip to sunny Falkirk along with around 50 other punters to see some bands playing. The Swiss Family Orbison were there - some of them used to be in Danny Wilson, you know - and did that strummy summery thing that they do, only not as catchily. They announced a cover to finish and following a guitar riff that sounded like it might be off 'War Pigs' or something, it turned out to be a metal (well, Gun-metal, ho-ho) version of "Don't You Want Me". Astrid were next and weren't bad though they seemed to be trying out new stuff (probably few of the sparse audience knew them so it didn't matter) but still sounded fine. Snow Patrol appeared next as a 3-piece (apart from keyboards for closing 'Starfighter Pilot' and similarly did a few new ones which were ok, but also 'Black and Blue' and others from the last album. Lots of the set was good but some of the more complex stuff probably needed the extra backing they get on the album as the tunes are maybe too intricate to stand up with just guitars.
Had to leave before the Cosmics and Sir Bob Geldof, sadly...
1st June: Well, everyone else is doing it, so let's give it a try... the blog is apart from anything else supposed to allow me to do quick mentions of what's going on without making them formal reviews with photos and stuff. We shall see...
