Showing posts with label Shirehorses. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Shirehorses. Show all posts

Tuesday 19 February 2019

Baggy Metal


For the first time in years, if not ever, I have listened to "Second Coming" by The Stone Roses, and while it's not a terrible album, it smacks of self indulgence and really doesn't do anything for me. It is generally loud and very rocky with baggy rhythms and the production is excellent.

In some was it reminds of poodle rockers like REO Speedwagon , Journey and Toto, very polished but not really much substance. I think I used to like "Ten Storey Love Song" but now it just passes me by and the eleven minute opener takes an age to to get started with a lot of noise, but it is well produced. Listening to it I almost feel like a "dad" in my criticism of it.

I loved their first album, everything about it, as well as the associated singles and remixes, and I just never tire of it, even though "Fool's Gold" owes a huge amount to "Halleluia" from Can's "Tago Mago". So maybe it is just the heights of the first album mean that the second album could not possibly live up to it, and there is nothing to touch "Love Is The Law" by John Squire's Seahorses.

I don't normally like dissing things but it will be making space on my phone for something a bit more moresome, but who knows what....and I need to include "I Know Our Kid" by The Shirehorses cos .. well you know


Saturday 1 November 2014

Halloween is Gone.November is Here and a Tenuous Link between The Toon and Nick Cave



Janus Looking Forward and Back
Well it's the ninth month (of the Roman calendar) and one of those where they'd run out of gods and politicians to name them after (it's been like that since September and will stay the same til the new year when Janus hit's us). The good news is it's Saturday and though it's five am I've had a decent night's sleep despite another early night.

Last night we had a few trick or treaters which were all young kids accompanied by their parents which was nice with on young witch deciding she wanted a tour of the house. They were all well costumed and very well behaved.




Although I find the initial concept of Halloween great fun , it's essentially adult and there's nothing cute about it.  While dressing up as a vampire or zombie can be great fun I wouldn't want to be one or live in a world populated by such creatures.

A friends of mine asked why women had to make their Halloween Costumes sexy , well all I would say is that it's personal choice, and you can still have a great costume without displaying any flesh, but the main thing is to have fun. There's a local Goth Night called the Charnel House and they published some pictures which I used for a slide show of one of the Spoon recordings from a long time ago which I have included as the video for this post , and it contains a lot of different costumes , but more to the point a lot of people having fun and enjoying themselves.



Added to that Newcastle fans are on a high after dumping Manchester City out of the League Cup . City did put out their second string , but their second string was still multi million pound buy internationals , Newcastle put out their second string with a lot of names I hadn't heard of. A Very impressive win. I've just realised I need to include two more videos because of this ( the match and The ShireHorses Nick Cave misappropriation)




Anyway, it's Saturday, I'm going to have a major rest because my body feels like it's been beaten with big sticks , so I think I'll be lounging on the settee watching catch up TV, and still enjoying the weekend. Take a leaf out of the Charnel House crowd's book and have a brilliant weekend everybody.

Thursday 19 April 2012

Not Dead .... You Just Have To Look

With National Record Shop Day approaching I wandered down Northumberland to check out HMV, until recently your only source of music on the high street unless theres a Tesco , or you go for the rack in the Pound Shops that are proliferating in in our relatively affluent society.  Time was when WH Smith and Boots has a sizeable music section but that's no more . HMV themselves are losing their identity with football shirts , Apple Product displays and DVDs and games taking a huge part of the display despite the fact that streaming media is negating the need for recorded films. How man do you watch more than once.

I Shrewsbury I found an HMV buried deep in a shopping centre. The shop was quite big , but the only new music was the new Madonna album and the metal section consisted of multiple copes of Black Sabbath Volume IV , Sabbath Bloody Sabbath and something by Avenged Sevenfold. Newcastle store is over three floors but the music side seems to be contracting by the second,


A surprise and welcome addition to the high street is the Thats Entertainment shops , outlets for Music Magpie. Their music is arranged by price and I picked up several limited editions (Crowded House Recurring Dream and Annie Lennox Medusa) for a couple of quid each. Second hand but excellent condition and the staff are helpful. I was suuprised to see a fair few Shirehorses albums which I thought were hard to get , well Fat Harry White is , so you you can pick up some decent stuff and they have more new stock than the Shrewsbury HMV!!

The Independents are doing well , there'll be queues outside from midnight on Friday but it's good to see there is now a choice of music on the high street.

Though of course you can always go to your local independent record shop !!