so much music, so little time...

Someone asked me why I decided to start a blog. The reason is pretty much to detail stuff that I don't have time to do elsewhere. For example, a new CD comes in and I know that it'll be a couple of months until it's reviewed in the next itm? (we don't have time to do reviews on Jockrock any more, sadly).
But the volume of CDs which arrive! I know why those guys called their website drownedinsound. Just back from the PO box and there's another 30 there, all requiring review (and as far as itm? is concerned, we will have to reassess our 'everything gets reviewed, as we'd need to print a 200-page magazine, or go weekly.) As an aside, some are not for me as such, but for the lucky winner of our '100 albums' draw. We have now gathered 35 or so of the target, and have credit notes at Avalanche and Monorail to eat into the rest of the prize fund.
Anyway, plenty of stuff may stand out and make me want to wax lyrical here, but since I hardly have the time to listen to all these CDs, it's when the disc box comes out of the package that the vital first impression is made. Names like David Jack, Four Tet and Electralane leap out because I know them already and am pretty confident they'll have produced somethnig worthwhile.
I also know and like British Sea Power, so their bribe of a free pencil was perhaps unnecessary. Payola!
Most impressive was a CD from Tantrum - again, a band I've heard before, but their Advice to Users album - actually a freely downloadable collection of mp3s at www.floppyrecords.co.uk - came in a muslin bag - hand-stitched, with a faux-leather label. I had to cut it open to get at the delightful mess of Cocteaus/Spacemen 3/MBV sounds within. Already Stewart Smith of fine award-winning zine Beard has also noticed Tantrum rise through the pile of CDs on his desk, so their ploy must be working.
However, the plan may be doomed to failure. Most journalists aren't allowed scissors...

The Man comes good

A first last night - well, kind of. I entered what was once the lair of The Man - Ivory Blacks in Glasgow, which until a wee while ago, was one of the city's most notorious P2P venues (P2P means, essentially, the promoter gets the choice of your first-born should you take a show there).
This is maybe a tad unfair - the venue is shrouded in mystery, the previous owner who gave it its name, Robert Fields, apparently claims that it wasn't Pay to Play until after he sold it. certainly it's been synonymous with the ripping-off of young upcoming bands.
Under its new guise it seems to have taken steps to shake off its reputation. Mainly by booking touring acts more usually gracing the stages of the Note or Sleazys, but to be fair, it's filling a gap in the burgeoning live scene in a city which has seen any pub with a spare corner and a 13 amp socket get on the venue bandwagon.
There is one point which seems like a legacy of the previous management - a decidedly curious mix of bands. Not quite the folk / death metal/techno combinations you get from a promoter intent on throwing together any bill just to rake in cash from the pals of said acts, but Sheffield's finest guitar/laptop abusers 65 days of static, and Aberdonian noisemongers Fickle Public, sit uncomfortably with at least one of the support acts, whose name I didn't catch but whose use of funky bass and sax leaves any members of the audience not there to hear them somewhat bemused.
The venue does have the legacy of a decent sound system however (a bit muddy at times but serious gear with half-a-dozen mikes on the drumkit alone). Also there's an area - behind a VELVET ROPE! - to the side for the bands to leave their gear and keep a tantalising distance from their fans (probably essential for the Sheffield troupe given the adulation shown).
Good sets from the 2 main attractions, by the way, though you'll have to read itm? to find out more...

the Tbreak effect

2 entries in one day. Yet, if I scroll down I see that around 5 posts ago I was talking about Tbreak 2004!
(for the uninitiated, this is the competition which allows bands to play at T in the Park's Unsigned Stage, entitling them to free tickets for the weekend, and the chance to play, depending on the weather, to either their mates plus 3 Slam tent refugees sleeping it off, or a tent packed with drenched revellers seeking shelter from the elements. Actually, that's quite harsh and doubtless it'll wind up the organisers*, but since they've not taken any advertising with us this year we're entitled. ;-)
Naa, the tent - or is it a stage? - has improved immeasurably in recent years, with a bar being installed (guess what, the tent's popularity has increased) and the sound is ok these days. This year we're even hoping the Slam tent won't drown out the acoustic acts.

Anyway, I am pleased to see in the final 48 (i.e. OFFICIAL, the best 48 unsigned bands in Scotland); Reograd, the Flying Matchstick Men, Satellite Dub and Luxury Car. There are other bands whose presence makes me smile, but the above are my SHOWBIZ MATES (i.e. acts who I've met, usually because we've put them on at a gig.)

The best way to wind them up is by describing it as a "battle of the bands". It's not, certainly in the traditional sense, as they don't pay to enter, and get Tennents lager (mmm) and possibly even cash money for performing if they get through. However, it is a battle (ok, competition) and there are bands involved.

Does this thing have a spell checker?

the great Scottish indie revival (slight return)

New year. New Franz.
ok, you'd not exactly call April the ideal time to start your new year resolutions, but having got a new Mac which will run OS X which runs Safari, which will run Blogger, maybe it's time.
I note that the last post I made, late last year, concerned Norwegian jazz. Maybe that was an omen. Since then there has abeen some discussion about exactly who the New Franz Ferdinand were going to be. Obviously that's a daft line of thinking; as far as chart-friendly Scottish acts went the selection's been prety thin for a while. but at this time of re-entering the world called blog, it's apt that there ARE some top releases coming from Scottish bands. Recently I've received new stuff from Belle and Sebastian, Sons and Daughters, Teenage Fanclub and (ahem) Mylo, all chart-bound. And all brimming with top tunes. (apart from Kim Carnes). More exciting than those, for purely indie-schmindie reasons, are the other releases also clogging up the itm? inbox. Datapanik (a new, improved bis, essentially), Satellite Dub (the thinking man's Mylo, we're told), deathmetalleers Macrocosmica, all with new releases. And, perhaps most excitingly, Hooker's Green #1, whose new album (with a stupidly long title) is on Snowstorm records, home to the likes of Candidate amd Isobel Campbell. Hopefully that heralds great things (on an indie-schmindie level) for the Aberdeen troupe, who have been decribed as a cross of Stereolab and Flaming Lips. The new Franz? Nice thought.