The gift of song
Hello, my name is Bob. Through the medium of song I shall seduce you. (Clears throat theatrically.) "You never close your eyes..." "Cheer up sleepy Jean oh what can it mean..." "Today is gonna be the day..." And so on. Yes, ha ha, I do have a romantic voice, I was a professional singer you know. Now.... you are falling under my spell. All I need to do is to strum a few chords on my guitar and you will leap into bed with me and the person who actually owns this fucking house will get no sleep and won't be able to get into his own bathroom in the morning but he thinks I sound like Vic Reeves' pub singer anyway so screw him.

I am becoming Rigsby

Unique, Japanese acapella versions of Steely Dan songs (and other 'rock classics')? Yes please.
"Your Favourite Songs Can Now Be Your Favourite Hummings" says Dokaka.

Why we are ashamed to be seen rocking
Christgau (via ToT): "British rock has always been "pop." Irony, distance, and the pose have been its secret since the Beatles and the Stones, partly because that's the European way and partly because rock wasn't originally British music--having absorbed it secondhand, Brits who made too much of their authenticity generally looked like fools."

Take it then Buy it - some songs to download (currently Johnny Cash, Langley Schools etc.)

re: Ashfordaisyak, singer of Leper in a Tumbledryer which still delights me... maybe his name is a play on Daisy Ashford, the eight year old author of The Young Visiters, which caused a sensation back in 1919.

"One morning Mr Salteena came down to brekfast and found Ethel had come down first which was strange. Is the tea made Ethel he said rubbing his hands. Yes said Ethel and such a quear shaped parcel has come for you. Yes indeed it was a quear shape parcel it was a hat box tied down very tight and a letter stuffed between the string. Well well said Mr Salteena parcels do turn quear I will read the letter first and so saying he tore open the letter and this is what it said"

British TV in all its multichannel C21st cable glory hit a new low at 10:52 this morning when I sat down to eat a juicy sausage and could find nothing - after sustained flicking - of any interest.

Eventually I found George Harrison singing a 'new' song Any Road which had a line I've heard before, maybe it's a new agey slogan or maybe George thought it himself: "When you don't know where you're going, any road will take you there." Later: I had to look it up, it's probably from Alice in Wonderland unless it predates that.

On the radio was a show featuring sounds from fruit machines. A very good thing but five minutes of it was enough.
Later: Resonance have a download archive here.

Reversing back to George - I enjoyed Beatallica, Beatles covers done Metallica style (via ILM), even though I am blissfully ignorant of Metallica's work. So all the presumably witty lyric changes go straight over my head, but I'm a sucker for any Beatles covers...

Learning to love old Neil
Alex says: "When I first heard Neil Young around 1975 (I was 12) I felt that he was a puff, a wimp. His voice is probably the least masculine in rock. I rediscovered him around 1987 when my first girl-friend left me. And I instantly fell in love with him on second sights on After the Goldrush. A consolation by someone who had experienced a similar loss. "

I say: When I first heard Neil Young around 1977 I felt that he was a wailing old tosser, in addition to being in all probability a puff and a wimp. The sort of guy who'd end up singing a maudlin load of cack about a dead dog approximately 15 years later (NB That's for Stevie (not his real name) who doesn't read this and has dismissed Neil Young's entire career on the basis that he thinks Old King sucks which it does, and I REALLY LIKE DOGS!!, but he's still wrong). Neil Young was to be lumped in with the bleeughhh likes of James Taylor and Cat Stevens. I rediscovered him roughly five years later in 1978 when Rust Never Sleeps came out and I read about it in a copy of Rolling Stone that I bought for a long train journey because it had Patti Smith on the cover looking like a sexy poet maniac on fire. My parents were sending me away for the summer to make me have some fucking fun or at least die trying (it was the first). So after reading about Neil I was mildly curious, although still suspicious of this old hippy daring to namecheck Johnny Rotten in a desperate attempt to appear relevant. Not long after I started to hear songs from the album. One of the greatest musical revelations of my life was hearing Powderfinger on the radio. After that, it wasn't long before I was down the local record library filling out cards ordering every Neil Young album available in the local borough, in the manner of a disturbing little freak. It was 10p to order them, and then you'd tape them on cheap C90s from Dixons. Sometimes Boots. What's changed.

The fascinating story of the subsequent 25 years of Neil Young being in my bloodstream and how I loyally suffered throughout the 80s buying Landing on Water and everything he's ever released will appear in Mojo Bores Supplement very soon.

Foo
Spotted today - Cerys Matthews busking. Danny Kelly talking loudly on his mobile. Kelly Osbourne looking confused (on a poster for Dorito's).

Recent essentials from 365 Days:
Arcesia's White Panther "strange rock music that sounds like the Doors, a great bellowing performance by Arcessi on vocals, and incomprehensible lyrics. "
The Central High School Cafeteria Band - First Rhapsody For Knives, Forks & Spoons parts 1 & 2. "the trade offs between the cutlery and piano make this a treat. "
 John Wells, Jill House [UCL]  - Trills, and Non-Pulmonic Airstream. Don't miss out on this - "Mere mortals would have cracked up at the first bilabial trill. But John and Jill are professionals, and keep going to the last alveolar fricative ejective."

Tony Pierce is right - Tsar rock!

Yes - from now on, things are gonna ROCK. I wish it to be stated that I [insert your name here] have a homoerotical crush on the singer from the Black Keys, especially if I was a bird. And there's nothing wrong with that. Alternatively, can I just say... Sharin Fooooo!!!!

Fish, chips and peas. And onions
You know when a song is really catchy is when you can sing along while hearing the chorus for the first time. I was bewildered and brainwashed earlier, upon hearing the Fast Food Song by the Fast Food Rockers (they don't rock) while flicking through the video channels. It was like a highly contagious DER-RUG what hooked me after one second-hand sniff - look - "a Pizza Hut a Pizza Hut! Kentucky Fried Chicken and a Pizza Hut! McDonalds... McDonalds... Kentucky Fried Chicken and a Pizza Hut!" Were you singing along already? It's so filthy, so dripping with 1010% CHEESE that I am about to slip into a coma.

Uhhh. I should never have looked up the website. One of the 'Rockers', Lucy is 21, blonde, blue-eyed, from Crewe, loves 'eating and shopping' and her specialty is 'being bendy'. Please kill me now. They're messing with my mind and I LIKE IT.

The Black Keys
"Feeling heartsick from love's tumult, sweating bullets in the middle of the night, drinking lightning from a corn liquor bottle, sitting in a room whose walls are so blue they look black, digging into the joy-and-pain double helix of existence and finding heavy soul, kicking out a blues rock rumpus in search of salvation...this is the electrifying world of The Black Keys and their sophomore album thickfreakness."
Ugh, don't read about them, just listen.

Downloads... Peel session tracks (temp, streaming show)... Streaming audio of the thickfreakness album.

The Transformation of Rubbish
"The eighties were crap..." Prolapse

I was just struck. Two things I enjoyed for polar reasons today are based in, rooted in, the group Tears For Fears. Now, they were no good, no bloody good at all, let's face it. Don't get an attack of the nostalgic rosy glasses, they were a terrible thing. Unless you disagree which is your right, and I'll fight for that right - to the very death - in my underpants.
But I played that Donnie Darko version of Mad World (by Gary Jules), slowed and stripped down, which got me going in the film (when I confess I thought it was a Talk Talk cover and therefore not quite as tragic a thing to admit to liking, me being a punk rocker and all) and it got me again today with my headphones on at work.
"The dreams in which I'm dying are the best I've ever had."
It got me so much I had to cut it short and flick on to the next random song. I can't be doing with having maudlin fits of weeping at my desk! You fuckers! I am a professional and standards of decorum must be maintained.
Oh God if only you knew.
My Tears For Fears double came when Osymyso's John's Not Mad later turned up on the random play. And it never struck me before but that uses Mad World as well. Well I never! Well, it never struck me because I paid very little attention to British pop music of the 1980s and thus I am not welcome at the revivalist disco where they all link hands and jig about to the Spandau Ballet and so to my everlasting shame I don't know the difference between Tears for Fears and Talk Talk because I was busy listening to ancient blues records mainly, which made me very popular.
If you don't know, John's Not Mad is mainly a mix of Dinah Washington's Mad About the Boy with clips from the extraordinary TV documentary about a Scottish lad with Tourette's Syndrome (see also: that Nirvana song and the first time the 'C' word was said on British TV, possibly, certainly about 100 times). Heartbreaking and hilarious in equal measures etc... "A few people told me they laughed and then felt guilty. Which I like," says Osymyso.

Now then, the message is, you delightful young guys and gals, is that recontextualized you see, jingle jangle, even the Tears for the Fears you see, I say, can be very good fun, yes indeed.

How did I end up here?

Covers
-- White Room (Cream) by Los Killers (Uruguay). Armenia City in the Sky (The Who) by Petra Haden (acapella). Both via Sharpeworld.
-- The Flaming Lips do live covers of songs by the Sex Pistols, Nirvana etc
-- Many Live show download links.

Round up
These are all the albums that I heard for the first time over the past two or three weeks, together with some quotes about them. I probably like something about all of them, but I'm not remotely interested in saying why. Isn't that refreshing?!

Bebel Gilberto - Tango Tempo
Whether played softly in the background of a quiet dinner party, or thumped out at a trendy dance hall, Tanto Tempo is always perfect, always inspiring... brings a contemporary sheen to classic bossa novas... Gilberto's voice is seductive, gorgeous, and earthy...

Aereogramme - Sleep and Release
A thunder-bunny of a long-player with ambition rivaling that of their fellow murderous Scot, Macbeth... depending on when you dropped the needle on this disc, you might think the group is heavy-metal, orchestral rock, or introspective folk pop... category-defying: raw and cooked, muscular and cerebral, shifting gears in seconds flat...

Minutemen - Ballot Result
I got angry, because it has been 17 years since D. Boon died and no other band has even come close to being half as intelligent, heartfelt, innovative or revolutionary as the Minutemen were... The trio charges through ferocious versions of Minutemen classics and sloppy but endearing covers... they were one of the greatest American bands of their time, and that's not an accomplishment to be sneezed at...

Iron & Wine -The Creek Drank The Cradle
With its whispered vocals, bluesy slide guitar work and beautiful vocal harmonies, The Creek Drank The Cradle sees Beam creating a minor masterpiece with extremely limited resources... For a plodding, semi-mopey bit of understated blues, it's hard to beat... Steeped as it is in the narrators' personal histories, The Creek Drank The Cradle is like a lost diary suddenly found...

Calexico - Feast of Wire
A unique fusion of bluesy Mariachi, desert-rock and jazz... Calexico immediately make you think of withering heat and scorching desert vistas... On their fourth album, the band twirl their spaghetti - western country-blues into pop, flamenco, jazz, classical and Latin, spawning some of their most arresting songs...

Johnny Cash - At Folsom Prison
The bastard sung or wrote some of the darkest songs ever, but did it with a certain grace and style... There's a unique and profound feeling in Folsom Prison and a timeless element that still today sends chills down your spine... The first few seconds of this live album still stand among the most electrifying in the history of concert recording...

Songs: Ohia - Magnolia Electric Co.
The wailing, desperate spirits that plagued Jason Molina through his earlier albums have been banished... Listened to properly, with the windows open and the stereo turned up loud, The Magnolia Electric Co is a midnight party in the swamp... this is the first Songs: Ohia record with more than one song that could be played at a strip joint or monster truck show...

Blur - Think Tank
Don't buy this if you're expecting the Blur of old... a globetrotter of a record, gallivanting through sound and time, mood and attitude, form and content... a soulful and subtle affair...

Dismemberment Plan - Change
At times, an incredibly powerful record that can make mundane ruminations seem like Socratic philosophy.... for the first time, they've made a record that fully explores their ability to craft gorgeous tunes... It's an enjoyable record, a necessary record in the evolution of the band, but far from an essential listen. ..

Turbonegro - Apocalypse Dudes
The new Turbonegro record is possibly the most important European record ever!... is this offensive, or are we talking grand Swiftian satire?... 100 per cent adrenaline-fueled insanity...

Yabby You - Dub It To The Top 1976-1979
superb horn lines, deeply-felt vocals and unrelenting, hard-driven rhythms...Yabby's vocals and production drop in and out of the classic King Tubby sound...darker, scarier, and more sublime than any reggae you're likely to have heard

Cinematic Orchestra - Every Day
Old jazz for the nu-jazz generation... Melancholic organ under-pinning with lilting saxophone strokes moves the lumbering landscapes of cacophony into gospel richness...a confederacy of jazz grooves and downtempo electronica...

Devendra Banhart - Oh Me Oh My
His debut album is so wildly out of step with contemporary music, it seems to belong to another era entirely...fragile fairy tales, accidental spirituals, warped glam blues and even the odd love song... combines fingerpicking acoustic guitar with crooning falsetto vocals and idiosyncratic, absurd lyrics...

Loose Fur - Loose Fur
Each song is meticulously arranged, and the thick harmonies belie the spare amount of mostly acoustic instruments employed...This is true cosmic American music and possibly the best thing all concerned have ever done... In its own fragile way, a delight...

Archer Prewitt - White Sky
On White Sky, Archer's going to party like it's 1971, and he doesn't care what you think about it...breezy, almost-Brazilian at times, pop with Bacharach-esque horns and broad arrangements with lots of breathing room and hooks galore... a comforting record that leaves you feeling nostalgic and sentimental in spite of yourself...

Soulwax bootleg (it's 64 mins but it's not the As Heard on Radio Soulwax Pt. 2 album?)
What do you get if you put together 45 tracks in the space of just over 60 minutes?... bootlegs reflect the demographic-free (albeit state-controlled) utopia of Radio One... Just Two Guys with a Digital Mixer and a Box Full of Tracks that You'd Never Think to Mix Together...

(This post was intended to make me sound up-to-date, eclectic and informed. Instead of a deluded old hipster twat who's missed the boat. Did it succeed?)

Consumption
Nick Cave's Babe I'm On Fire is the list song to consume all the rest, in its monomaniac 40-verse assertion that we are all of us, somehow, on fire-yah! I like how different lines stand out each time you hear it. This morning I was especially struck by:
"The athlete with his hernia says it
Picasso with his Guernica says it".
And not only that, but "My wife with her furniture" apparently says it too!
To get your point across there is often nowhere to go but absurdity, and Babe I'm On Fire spirals off into the highest realm of loopiness.
"The foxhunting toff says it, the horrible moth says it.." And so on.

Bulletin
I had a vision. I was on a bus and oversaw a phrase in a fellow passenger's book - it pains me to strip clean the mystique like this - and I swilled it around my mouth, maybe even palate, chewed thoughtfully on a mental cashew nut until finally, I embellished it into the magical phrase "Bull3tin5 from the Cr7pt of Os1r1s".

Then I bought a digital camera and took some pictures of my feet. After that, I started to put together a website under this mighty umbrella of Bull3tin5 from the Cr7pt of Os1r1s. Some of the pages have MusicKal content even! But not many...
-- the Paul McCartnety (spelling?) impostor
-- the Smiths vs So Solid Crew - hard to explain
-- the Patti Smith postcard
-- Bob Dylan lobbing a brick
-- Gorky's Zygotic Mynci stuff I collected like a tart
-- the Guilt of it all!

There's a lot more stuff too, of little interest unless you're me. If you are me, please give me a call and tell me where you've been. I've got some packages for you.

Is the Beatles (you know them) poof's music? This is the view I heard expressed recently, by which I mean half an hour ago, in relation to the Rolling Stones being the Anti-Poof Solution, even now. I was rather alarmed to hear this theory put forth by persons I imagined, I dunno, vaguely sane. Plus, "Poof" is so 1970s.

PS. Poof = Latent Brit term for camp homosexual, eg, John Inman Are You Being Served "I'm free!" and so on. Not to be confused with 'poofy hair' which, whatever it is, is not the same thing at all.

I don't normally explain things, I just expect you to know or you can shove off.

Hey... I just saw the connection between 'shove' the verb and 'shovel' the object that shoves. Dirt into the ground. Maybe this isn't worthy of recording. Maybe it's a linguistic accident. Maybe not that interesting. After all.

Oh man. (Said without irony cause that's how I speak, baby. In my head, I adopt the full-on hippy-beatnik tongue for reasons I'd rather not investigate.) 'They' are playing New Order's Sunrise the instrumental one that sounds like Mike Oldfield. That song has a very special meaning for me which you are not allowed to know. You got that? It is none of your business.

And earlier there was Rumours playing, can you believe that! I didn't object. It was never really part of my life for me to get misty-eyed or furious with misplaced punkosity about.

Yes my septic tank IS working properly. Now please leave me alone.

The loveless fascination
We know nostalgia is bad for the circulation but I had a great gulp of it watching Donnie Darko at the weekend (yeah I'm so up to date) when Under the Milky Way by the Church came on, because it came out in 1988 the year in which the film's set you see, and it was all over MTV when I was in America in that year so that was why. I bought one of their albums back then but it sounded like Echo & the Bunnymen so I didn't keep it. I tried to like them because I thought they would be good for me, but I never really got there. So - sorry, the Church. But you did that great song. I didn't mind The Killing Moon being the film's title song though. My rating: 9/10, whatever the hell it was all about. I'm a sucker for anything with themes of rebirth and redemption. Oh I'm ripe for being born again baby!

Key musical moment from the other film I saw at the weekend: A murderous revenge fantasy to the soundtrack of Heart of the Sunrise in a strip joint battles against the promise of Christina Ricci in a sleazy hotel room. Nine out of ten again, for all the wrong reasons.

The Classical
My top three musical moments of the week:
TV - The Classic Albums treatment of Dark Side of the Moon late last night on BBC 2. It is a towering thundering timeless thing of wonder and beauty, I thought. So say it loud, say it proud!
Book - Reading Our Band Could Be Your Life was inspirational. I knew it would lead to the brushing off of various Black Flag tapes, the chinstroking reappraisal of the Buttholes earlier work and so on... But renewed love for the Minutemen was the big stick.
Radio - The (Captainless) Magic Band's ATP set as played on Peel in midweek. He was tearful at the end, after their Big Eyed Beans, with Drumbo on vocals. The whole thing was miraculous, a fresh and joyful reinvention.

Yes, I listened to lots of new albums as well. Give me 20 years and I'll let you know what I think. Meanwhile, it was fresh perspectives on the 70s, 80s. Now I have six hours of Northern Soul to listen to. It's all good. That should be my musical motto - "it's all good".

(later) Of course it isn't all good, but I think this may be my answer to that tiresome question "what kind of music do you like?" I think it's a misguided query about the self, masquerading as a question, but as it's unanswerable, it really doesn't merit a serious response. I'll try and remember that one next time someone asks, too.

The Doors lawsuit-fight-revival is a profoundly depressing spectacle (via The Rub.) No one who matters, who knows, who really cares, wants it. And why oh why oh why is Henry Rollins writing songs for them? I hereby challenge him to a naked wrestling match.

Right now, I am enjoying the hell out of James Brown's Hey America (It's Christmas), Frank Kafka at the Zoo by the Clean and Yes by Aereogramme.