Showing posts with label NME. Show all posts
Showing posts with label NME. Show all posts

Tuesday 19 November 2019

A Record - Godbluff


This is post 317 this year, that surpasses last year's total of 316, so any more posts this year will just cement 2019 as my most prolific posting year ever. I have no need to actually surpass that, and this year I wasn't actually trying to surpass last year, but I just did.

This, for some reason reminded me of "Godbluff" by Van Der Graaf Generator, another of my favourite albums, which consists of four songs and is an incredibly atmospheric album punctuated by Peter Hamill's staccato stabbing words and vocals. The NME reviewed it favourably but commented that it needed a format that allowed it to be played non stop (this was mid seventies, 1975). Obviously CD facilitated this but there was the option of recording it to one side of a C90 cassette or if you were posh a cassette player that had autoreverse. Classical music had the same problem, but I play vinyl now and don't mind turning the record over, and also think that twenty minutes is a fine length to listen to a piece of music.

I found a copy of the album, so you can also listen to it non stop now thanks to digital technology or you can buy it on the link below.

This morning I was getting my weekly tablets, and one of the things is that tablets have their own boxes and colour scheme. This morning I notices that my Metformin have changed from a blue compact box to a green long box, the same a s Doxazosin. I had mistakenly pulled out some new Metformin instead of Doxazosin. Now I know we are resistant to change, even when it benefits us, but this is not a good change, I could have been double dosing on Metformin and not getting Doxazosin. Now I spotted it but there may be many who don't do this. I think I may go to chemist and feed this back, you can see here. on my Instagram feed.

It's minus 3 degrees centigrade, cars are iced up, so will be a cold walk to work.

Monday 23 September 2019

Break


One of the benefits of listening to vinyl is that you listen to a whole side with no option for a remote break, and on a normal well planned album those sides seldom pass twenty minutes and definitely not twenty five minutes, so you are given a natural break. Todd Rundgren's "Initiation" clocked in about thirty five minutes a side which always needed to be played with a new diamond needle. That was not a good idea. Also somewhat strange that his classic "Todd" clocked in at just over sixty minutes and was a double album.

When Van Der Graaf Generator's "Godbluff" was released the NME reviewer said that we needed a continuous play medium (actually one side of a C90 cassette or an 8-Track tape would have provided that) but CD and MP3 satisfied that perfectly and some albums are best listened to in a non stop sequence.

But I bought four second hand albums at the weekend for a tenner from Vinyl Guru and on Sunday morning listened to side one of "Tomorrow Belongs To Me" by The Sensational Alex Harvey Band followed by side one of "This Is The Moody Blues" especially for the closing song "Legend of A Mind" one of my favourite songs of theirs.

Digital music has no limitations and vinyl has lots , but vinyl is more of a personal experience and you feel closer to and more in touch with the music. The may sound trite but the sounds produced from an analogue vinyl source are always a pure curve whereas digital is always a series of defined steps however small they may be.

So how do we soundtrack this, of course Youtube is a digital medium and this is a digital medium but we shall go for "Action Strasse" from the first album I played yesterday.

Goodnight and God Bless,

Monday 15 April 2019

#AprilSongs #15 Monday Night


The #AprilSongs is sort of a bit of a chore but I am determined to complete it and it has made me revisit and discover music in my collection live today's selection "Monday Night" by The Golden Palominos from their eponymous album.

The Golden Palominos are (or were ) a fluid inventive and adventurous musical collective led by drummer Anton Fier  with a core set of musicians featuring Bill Laswell and Nicky Skopelitis, but among their guests were Michael Stipe, John Lydon and Fred Frith, as well as many others.

I first got into them when I bought "A Dead Horse" probably on the basis of a John Peel play or NME review or both, and was blown away by the way it was both incredibly polished but so far away from the rock norm while also being very close to it, with stunningly clear production.

I am now wondering whether to treat myself to a vinyl copy, because my record player sounds so good, but I can also listen to it on the walk to work or from my network, so maybe that is just another thing that I don't need to buy, but we shall see.

So it's Monday morning and time to drag myself out to work.

Have a good one everyone.

Saturday 21 July 2018

Flexibly Free

Back in the sixties and seventies music was often promoted by giving away vinyl flexidiscs. These were'nt meant to last but were meant to give you a taster of something so you would buy the actual single or album and generate income for the artist and definitely the record company.

The thing is sometimes these flexidiscs contained exclusive music (at the time), I'm thinking Alice Cooper's "Slick Black Limousine" which was promoting "Billion Dollar Babies" and the interludes on the promo for the Rolling Stones' "Exile on Main Street". These were both NME freebies as it was my music mag of choice at the time. Both these were committed to cassette as soon as I got them, but were lost way back. They may be worth something now.

I recently bought a couple of flexidiscsfor Long Play Cafe / Empire Records in The Grainger Market and was surprised that the Adam and The Ants one had no track name on , but is their take on The Village People's "YMCA" called apparently "IMCA". Because the flexidiscs slip you need to put a couple of coins to stop the vinyl slipping.  The other was by Hazel O'Connor and you can see the details here. LAter sounds actually started giving away vinyl EPs.

But in the sixties we started getting loss leader compilations. At first I thought these would be very expensive, but they were very cheap and full of amazing music. Again these often contained music you couldn't get anywhere else, I'm thinking "America", Yes' ten minute take on the Siman and Garfunkel song and Led Zeppelin's "Hey,HeyWhat Can I Do" on the "Age of Atlantic" samplers.

The first one that I bought was Island's "Nice Enough To Eat" which introduced me to Nick Drake, Fairport Convention, King Crimson and many more.

In the disgital age Amazon used to give free downloads but that seems to have stopped but often artists make music available to download for free in exchange for an email address.

I suppose music is still effectively free to listen to on the radio and Youtube, but I do like to have the music and make sure the artist gets something from me.

Well I am looking out at the blue sky and sunshine and think its time to wake the neighbours by mowing my overgrown jungle of a lawn.

Today Fiona and Helen are doing a 26 Mile walk for MacMillan which you can track here and donate here.

Have a most enjoyable day

Monday 23 April 2018

#TenAlbumsInTenDays #6 - Godbluff - Van Der Graaf Generator


When this album came out the NME reviewer said that there should be a way of playing it end to end without a break, the vinyl record had to be flipped half way through to continue listening. This was an understandable thought as that's how most classical pieces were concieved , to be played and listened to in their entirety.

This thing is at the time there were C90 cassettes and 8-Track tapes (the later just effectively played in an everlasting circle) so there was a way to listen to it. CD and Digital obviously made this a reality for the new format.

When they started although a rock group, guitars were way down the instrumentation list which was odd for such an aggressive sound but it was dominated by keyboards, brass , woodwind and bass pedals.

Godbluff is a very dark sounding album, almost threatening conjuring up images of dark threats in blasted landscapes and is still a regular listen for me. It is remakably coherent and often I get the songs mixed up as they are so similar in form without being boring, you just accept it for what it is.

I love most of their stuff but this along with "Pawn Hearts" are two of my most played of their albums. I found a live performance of the album so if you have forty or so minutes to spare you can see what I mean about the album.

Thursday 8 March 2018

Fermat's Last Theorem, Pills, RIP NME on International Women's Day


It is International Women's Day and I am shocked how18th Century most of our politicians and people in power are, continually denying what women want , true equality. But it's similar with race and lots of other artificial human divisions. Misogyny is still rife and is prevalent in men and women. While I would employ a skinny small woman as a hod carrier, I wouldn't employ a skinny small man to do the smae job, but there are lot's of women who would make a far better hod carrier than I. But follow the link and remember treat everyone with the respect they deserve and do not discriminate.

Reading the Simon Singh book I finally found out what Fermat's Last Theorem is and the problems it has caused. In lots of nots he said he had found irrefutable proof that there are no natural numbers (1, 2, 3,…) x, y, and z such that xn + yn = zn, in which n is a natural number greater than 2. This was finally proved in 1995 by Andrew Wiles with help from his friend Richard Taylor . See article here.

Homer Debunks Fermat's Last Theorem
The Simpsons supposedly debunked the theorem and you can too, but only because of the
inaccuracies of ten digit pocket calculators.

I'm only forty pages into "The Simpsons and Their Mathematical Secrets" but it is providing me with both entertainment and knowledge. Aren't books just wonderful.

 



Tomorrow the final edition of The New Musical Express will hit the shelves. They went to a free publication but it is the end of a music journalism era but given that most news is gleaned from the internet these days it's probably no surprise. It will probably continue online which you can visit here.

I've been listening to the excellent "Masseduction" by St Vincent and had been hearing "Pills" on the radio and it sounds like a mash up of a Disney Musical soundtrack with a latter day Depeche Mode backing band, and it is brilliant.

It's frosty this morning so wrap up and have a great Thursday, and spare a thought for Spurs fans this morning.

Saturday 21 October 2017

Slightly Suffering


Yesterday I had my 'flu' jab and it's hitting me this morning. So like the sensible person I am I was up at six o' clock to walk to Post Office to pick up an unknown package which turned out to be a copy of Emerson Lake and Palmer's "Brain Salad Surgery" (or Brian's Salad is in the Surgery as the NME named it) on vinyl, which I wanted for the wonderful HR Giger designed sleeve (which apparently he was never paid for see here). The album is not that good , but the cover is wonderful.

Anyway I got there ten minutes early so walked up the A69 and instagrammed a bit of  Hadrian's Wall which I knew was there but I'd never got the chance to photograph before, so I instagrammed it here

It's Saturday and there's no sign of #StormBrian, and I am ahead on my step target, and I have been listening to a few more albums, on of which is "A Trick of The Tail" by Genesis. It was the first one without Peter Gabriel so possibly didn't bode all that well, and you can hear Phil Collins' influence taking effect although the album is still excellent. One thing that people forget about Phil Collins is that he is an excellent drummer , and also was an accomplished actor and you can hear that on the vocal stylings of "Robbery Assault and Battery".

The Album is bookended by "Dance on a Volcano" and "Los Endos", really two parts of the same piece , featiring a vicious backing to the verses which bears little relation to the melody but is still a brilliant aural assault and worth the price of admission alone. "Dance on a Volcano" slipps into the creepy dream state of "Entangled". Many of the song feature some excellent instrumental codas, and the title track is the penultimate song on the album,was inspired by Tony Banks reading William Golding's "The Inheritors" which described an alien visiting Earth and the reaction to it.

So I will leave you with "Dance on A Volcano"  but the album is worth getting hold of. Have a brilliant Saturday everyone.

Sunday 7 June 2015

Guilty Pleasure?


Pleasurable
Often people talk about guilty pleasure, usually about some record that they shouldn't like but do. I'm
probably repeating myself on this post but what the hell. If you like a song then it's good. As a kid and even into adulthood peer pressure can stop you enjoying what you like. I always go on the premise that 95%  is rubbish and it's your job to find the good stuff, and there is a lot of good stuff about.

So I don't feel guilty about any of my pleasures , good music is good music, and rubbish is rubbish, I've just realised I can build an MP3 sampler on Amazon of music I think is excellent  but you may unfriend me on facebook for, So here is a list for you to sample.


The main song I'm going to choose is the Bay City Roller's take on Tim Moore's Rock and Roll Love Letter, which is rather excellent. I remember the NME deciding that Eric Faulkner was the greatest guitarist ever as he could sol and wave at the crowd simultaneously . Also ironically the only Bay City Rollers track in my collection is on the soundtrack to The Filth And The Fury, Julian Temple's film about The Sex Pistols.  Enjoy your weekend my lovely friends