Not too much to report. It's mostly been just a few things. The Replacements' 'Valentine' has been stuck in my head most of the week. AND THAT IS AN AWESOME THING.
Last night, exhausted after a busy day of work, I just lay on my floor and listened to my favourite Replacements songs. It was exactly what I needed.
I had a really great conversation with Nick Leet from High On Stress for the latest Etcetera ETC With Young Southpaw on Thursday. An hour for the podcast then an additional hour after I stopped recording. We have very similar tastes in music. High On Stress are one of my big musical discoveries of this year. If you like The Replacements, I highly recommend checking them out. And Nick sent me this link of them doing a cover of 'Valentine'. High On Stress' 'Work Release', first song on their new record, has also been stuck in my head quite a bit.
Picked up the new Wendy James album today. Looking forward to listening as soon as I'm done writing this. Title track is lovely
Read this interview with Tricky and realized he has a new record out, Fall To Pieces. Listened to his 20 20 EP from March. Dug them both and bought them. My favourite being this from the EP
Loving 'The Bureau', will finish Season One tonight.
Been reading William Boyd's 'Armadillo'. Loved his Bond novel so when I was at the bookstore a couple weeks ago and saw this compared to Kingsley Amis & Evelyn Waugh I picked it up. I'm enjoying it.
The Divine Comedy's 'Absent Friends' was stuck in my head a lot earlier this week. The perfect song for these times
Heavenly's 'Modestic' has also been in my head quite a lot lately. What a great tune, especially the drive of the chorus
And Katie Dey's 'Darkness' keeps getting stuck in there too, like for weeks now
Had three, count 'em three, great musical discoveries this week!
High On Stress - I saw the comparisons to The Replacements and early Soul Asylum and they are not wrong! Great songs. Bought the album today
Told Slant - lovely tunes, looking forward to hearing more
And Emma Tricca. Gorgeous voice, melodies, and arrangements. The last by Colorama's Carwyn Ellis, who I spoke with a few years back about Welsh music for The Quietus and met up with him in a pub in Cardiff to talk more music. Great guy. He was involved in Sarah Cracknell's last solo record too. Yesterday I spent a lot of time listening to Ms. Tricca and today I bought 'Relic' and 'St Peter'.
I heard Emma on 'Lodge 49', which I've been loving. I was taken in by the Pynchon-esque name and was a bit hesitant after the first episode but I'm glad my friend Michelle convinced me to continue. My sort of thing, full of crazy quests. And they seem to play Broadcast an awful lot. I hope to finish the series this evening.
Continuing on my Diana Rigg kick and luckily there's some more great stuff on YouTube.
'Theatre Of Blood' with Vincent Price
And one of her first TV roles, 'The Hot House', which is quite odd, though she's very good in it.
And my friend Rick tracked down her TV debut I believe, the 'A Very Desirable Plot' episode of 'The Sentimental Agent'. Aired on November 23, 1963, though I don't know when in relation to 'An Unearthly Child'. She's great in this also, of course.
And since re-reading John Higg's KLF book, I've been thinking about Dada a lot lately. Considering that like Dada, Young Southpaw is an appropriate reaction to a world gone mad. There's some documentaries on YouTube I've got lined up and watch Vic Reeves' one the other night
I interviewed John Higgs for the latest Etcetera ETC With Young Southpaw podcast this week. Great conversation. Recently read his 'Stranger Than We Can Imagine: An Alternative History Of The 20th Century' and loved it. Really looking forward to delving into 'Watling Street' and 'The Future Starts Here'. Recently there was a reissue of his book about the band TC Lethbridge, written before they'd ever played a gig. I really dig that opening ROCK riff:
Matthew Reed Baker tweeted about Can's 'Future Days' which had me throwing the album on, and this bootleg. And thinking how wonderful it must have been to have made this music.
Mostly stuck in my head this week is Carla Easton's fantastic POP song 'Never Knew You'. First time I heard this, I looked up to see if my computer hadn't suddenly started playing Taylor Swift. Infectious chorus. Great video too
Realized that although I had bought John Higg's KLF book when it came out in 2012, I had never finished it. I'd read about 80% of it back then but I decided to re-read the whole thing this week. Excellent stuff. Such an insane, fantastical, and inspiring story. Spent some time watching the old KLF videos too. 'Stand By The JAMS' stuck in my head too:
And their performance at The Brits in 1992. Oh man. So amazing that something like that would ever happen at a music industry event
Diana Rigg's passing really hit me hard. She was just so wonderful. Iconic as Emma Peel and Tracey Draco/Bond, and as herself, watching interviews with her, her spirit was just so...well, wonderful. She will be missed. I watched the one episode of her 1973 US sitcom 'Diana' on YouTube - if anyone has the others, I'd like to see them - and these fun and insightful tv interviews.
I started reading Kathleen Tracy's biography of her too, which I had picked up at The Iliad bookshop in LA right before lockdown.
With so much Avengers on my mind, Honor Blackman & Patrick Macnee's 'Let's Keep It Friendly' has been stuck in my head too.
I had a dream last night that Martin Newell had a new song that used the same chords and feel as Hanoi Rocks' '11th Street Kidz' and it was as EXCELLENT as that sounds. It kind of morphed into 'Cheyenne' when I woke up and that was stuck in my head most of the early part of today.
Then L-Space posted about favourite songs not in English and I listed 7 right off the bat. There's tons, and I was very pleasantly reminded of this Nina Brodskaya song from the 1973 screwball Russian comedy 'Ivan Vasilievich: Back to the Future'. Such a fantastic pop song, full of spirit, longing, and drive.
Been way into Aquirax Uno again lately. His illustrations are full of wonder and very aesthetically pleasing to me
First up this week for getting stuck in my head, hitting home more and more as the years go by, is The Melting Ice Caps' 'Selfish Bachelor'. The original, fully orchestrated version which unfortunately isn't on the internet, but there is a live performance of something close to it from 2010
I interviewed Carla Easton for this week's Etcetera ETC With Young Southpaw episode. Her 'Weirdo' is currently my pop album of the year. It's fantastic; enormous energy, huge sound. My favourites switch all the time, which is one of the signs of a great album. 'Never Knew You' is amazing, great video too. On my first listen to the whole record, I looked up during the first verse to see if my device hadn't started playing Taylor Swift for some reason.
Most stuck in my head this week has been Blast Off Country Style's 'Cutie Pie'. Which was the first song I heard when I turned on college radio when I got to college. Went straight down to Newbury Comics and bought the cd. Incredibly catchy and fun.
Fightmilk have a new single out. Need I say more?
Bought that, the Illuminati Hotties album, and Honeyblood's 'Killer Bangs' single on this last Bandcamp Friday.
Downloaded all the texts from my friend Andy who passed away last week. 262 pages since November 2018 when I switched to iPhone. Looking forward to grabbing all my old phone's messages when I get back to them. When I was driving cross country in February, rushing to meet up with him in Phoenix for the day and a half he'd be there, I mentioned I had listened to 120 Lucksmiths songs one day in the car. He'd never heard them but I was sure he'd appreciate them. He asked me to send him their best song so I sent him 'There Is A Boy Who Never Goes Out'. He said it was 'pretty good' but then YouTube starting playing him The Beths and he got REALLY into them. Loved 'em. So I listened to their album again which is pretty great. I love the sound of their guitar lead lines.
Then yesterday I woke up with a song stuck in my head and I was wondering how I was ever going to remember what it was. This dismayed me but I remembered I emailed a friend about it sometime in the past year and if it came down to it, I could go through all our old emails. Luckily it didn't come to that and I finally placed it as 'Come In You'll Get Pneumonia' by The Easybeats. It's basically one big great chorus
Today I woke up with Diane Coffee's 'Like A Child Does' stuck in my head and it has stayed
