peter chilvers / sandra o'neill

One of my most played albums of the past year or so has been Far Off Country.

Credited to Letka, this is basically the duo of Peter Chilvers and Sandra O'Neill, who've worked together for some years. Quite why the duo decided on the name Letka is something of a mystery, as it makes them sound as if they are an Eastern European pop star. They’ve previously collaborated on a couple of albums under the name of Alias Grace (which sounds like it ought to be a quietly pretentious 4AD band).

 

This stuff is sadly hard to find – and only seems to be available via the Burning Shed mail order company set up by Tim Bowness, Pete Morgan and Peter Chilvers - 

https://www.burningshed.com/ 

This is definitely the best label / record company in the world. Everything they release is well worth a listen.

 

Anyway, Far Off Country is just wonderful.

The whole album has a vaguely This Mortal Coil air about it – the fact that most of the songs are covers adds to this feeling - think of “My Father” or “Tarantula” from Filigree and Shadow and you’re sort of getting there. It's melancholy, but never sad, wistful not depressing. Country music classics like "Banks Of The Ohio" and "Country Roads" are stripped back to delicate keyboards and bare bones arrangements, but it's Sandra O'Neill's gorgeous voice that dominates. The purity and beauty of her vocals are simply stop-you-in-your-tracks astonishing. Interestingly, despite these classic American songs, the album really doesn't sound American at all. Yet somehow it still conjures up images of wide open plains, mountains, streams and deserts, but seen though a haze, half remembered, it has an almost dreamlike quality – it does indeed inhabit a Far Off Country – the title is absolutely apt. 

 

Letka's cover of "Not A Job" (originally by the resolutely un-American Elbow) is breathtaking. Chilvers' gently pulsing keyboards and O'Neill's stunning overlapping vocals make this arguably the highlight of the album.

The final track is a blissed out take on Gillian Welch’s “I Dream A Highway” which is astoundingly good. Long, dreamy, full of regret and longing. Brian Eno loved it so much that he suggested a whole new genre needed to be invented for it - Future Country. And Eno himself was involved on the gorgeous opening song “Beyond The Fold”. The lulling sway of the melody is very Enoid, the backing vocals are a gentle choir of multiple Brians and the mood is a bit like very relaxed “Spinning Away”. A truly brilliant song.

 

This is an album that has been played and replayed over and over and I love it more each time.

 

 

Alias Grace, Peter and Sandra's earlier collaboration, created two albums.

 

The first was Embers in 1998 and while it's simpler and less expansive than Far Off Country it is no less delightful. It's about as gentle an album as it's possible to be. Vaguely folky, sort of ambient pop, lovely piano work, gorgeously pure vocals, bitter sweet lyrics. It's a very pretty album, and I mean this in the most appreciative way.

 

I love all sorts of music - yesterday I listened to a cracking 1981 gig by Bauhaus which was harsh, snotty and angry - and I loved it. But I find an awful lot of modern music to be coarse and ugly. Most modern pop chunders along on a bed of lumpen beats and unimaginative synths; it's all the same, nothing terribly innovative, and it sounds just thrown together.

 

But this, Embers, by Alias Grace, has a genuine beauty about it. It's been carefully hand crafted and it's lovely, delicate, and very very pretty. And I love it. Clearly a lot of care has been taken in creating this music. The opening "Talk Simple" is a reworking of no-man's "Tulip" and it's wonderful. Over an insistent pulse Sandra O'Neill's vocals just soar. "I need somebody to hold my hand, I need somebody who understands" - can't argue with that! Other highlights include the terribly sad "Cry Sweet Child" which seems to outline the breakdown of a relationship in a manner that hits home in a very subtle way, there's a loneliness at the heart of this song which is terribly affecting. "Counting The Stars" is another favourite of mine, more upbeat with a lovely tumbling chorus. Chilvers piano playing, on this song, and on the whole album, is exemplary, perfectly framing the songs.

The second record, 2001's Storm Blue Evening, is basically more of the same, but with a few more instruments, and what sounds like a bigger production budget. It sounds like it might have been recorded in a studio rather than someone's house. These are albums made for the sheer love of it, not because they were going to have a hit or anything (though many of the songs are distinctly catchy and in a fairer world they really ought to be huge successes). One such is Storm Blue Evening's "Nightshift" which is a terrific piece, or perhaps the opening "Feel The Hush". 

 

But in reality I suppose these records are too good for the charts, too delightful, too delicate - simply beautiful songs, beautifully played and sung.

 

There is one more track that I need to mention - on a Burning Shed sampler you can find Alias Grace's cover of Kate Bush’s “Under The Ivy” which is just stunning and achieves the very rare feat of beating Kate Bush at her own game. This has always been one of my favourite Kate tracks, but hearing Sandra O'Neill sing it is actually even better. Heartbreakingly good.

 

I simply can't recommend this music highly enough.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

rambling thoughts - weird music

When I was 15 / 16 I had quite a collection of albums that were, for want of a better word, really weird.

How about Fripp and Eno's (No Pussyfooting)? Two long pieces of guitar drones and synth noises. I loved it.

 

I recently dug out another Eno related album - After The Heat, the second album he recorded with the German duo Cluster, and the one with three of Eno’s best (and oddest) songs.

As good as the instrumentals are, and they are all very lovely indeed (tracks like “The Shade” or the very pretty “Old Land” are truly excellent), it’s the three songs that dominate this record.

“The Belldog” is as lush and as rounded as an Eno song ever was. The delightfully burbling synths really compliment Eno’s excellent vocals and the ever so pretty descending piano lines are wonderful.

On the other hand, “Broken Head” is weird and dark and foreboding, and is equally as good as “The Belldog” but just in an entirely different way. In a way it almost prefigures the dark and squelchy sound of records like Nerve Net.

Then we have the sheer oddness of “Tzima N’Arki” – adding all those backwards lines from “Kings Lead Hat” to an extremely jerky rhythm track (with the King of German weirdoes Holger Czukay on bass) and the end result is one of the strangest tracks to close an album ever.

But it’s all rather marvelous - totally unlike anything else. I first heard this record in my mid teens and although it partly baffled me, it intrigued and fascinated me too. It would be nice to think that other 16 year olds might discover this album, but these days I wonder if many would listen to something so leftfield…

rambling thoughts - bryan ferry can't dance

BBC4 showed the classic Roxy Music at Frejus Arena gig a while back and I recently got around to watching it. I've seen this August 1982 show many times before but it's always worth another look.

 

It was recorded at a beautiful Roman amphitheatre in the south of France, a terrific venue for the louche cool of Roxy (and King Crimson was the support act that night!). This is Roxy Music on the Avalon tour and what a darned fine show it is.

 

Excellent musicianship, cracking performances, and loads of Bryan Ferry lolloping across the stage in a weird attempt to dance. His singing was spot on, but the man simply cannot dance. He hasn't got a funky bone in his body. Every movement is jerky, out of time and supremely awkward. He's always been like it, but the gently insistent funkiness of the Avalon era band seems to inspire him to attempt to dance more than usual at this show.

 

The result is the King Of Cool basically doing embarrassing Dad dancing.

 

nico - live 1979 and more

I've been playing a lot of Nico's music recently. Can't explain why, really.

I listened to the marvellously icy wastelands of The Marble Index and Desertshore the other week - it's not really music in the commonly accepted sense. And the songs are only songs in a fairly loose sense. I don't know what it is really. But I genuinely do actually like it. So many of the lyrics are just that little bit skewed. As English wasn't her first language you get disconcertingly odd phrases, like in "Lawns Of Dawns": 'having thrown a joke on you and me' - throwing a joke? For that matter, I wonder what Lawns Of Dawns actually are?

The other day I dug out a couple of excellent gigs from CBGB's in 1979.

These represented Nico's first shows in the USA for about 8 years, and her first anywhere since about 1975. The period between 1974's The End… and this reappearance wasn't a good one for Nico. Lost in a deepening narcotic fog there's precious little information about her life for about five years of the 1970s. No gigs, no records, nothing. She even sold her harmonium in order to fuel her habit. She was living in Paris in 1978 and met Patti Smith at a concert. Patti was stunned to discover that Nico had no money, no home, nothing at all. Upon her return to New York Patti spoke to John Cale who was similarly shocked that Nico's life had sunk so low, and both agreed that the CBGB's crowd would be a good audience for Nico. So she was brought to New York and in early 1979 Nico played a series of shows at the famously scuzzy club. And, as Cale and Patti had predicted, went down a storm. 

I have two, very well recorded, audience recordings, two sets from one night in February, and Cale and guitarist Lutz Ulbrich accompany Nico on a number of songs. At later New York gigs the Dead Boys' Cheetah Chrome would sometimes play guitar, and at a couple of shows Roland Young, the saxophonist from the Sun Ra Arkestra, apparently accompanied Nico. Goodness knows what that sounded like!

Anyway, back to February - Cale adds viola to songs like "No-One Is There" and Lutz and Cale try to Velvet up "Femme Fatale" a bit. But mostly it was simply Nico and a harmonium, a new one bought for her by Patti Smith. Interestingly at least half the set is previously unrecorded songs, tracks that would later be recorded in radically different form on Drama Of Exile. Songs like "Genghis Khan" and "Henry Hudson" are simple harmonium pieces here, and never sounded sadder. "Purple Lips" had actually been debuted on French tv far back in 1975, but was still new to the Bowery audience. Nico sounds pleasantly surprised by the response of the crowd, and she delivers a cracking performance. During the second show she gets stuck during "Frozen Warnings" and plays the same part over and over whilst clearly rummaging around in her mind for the next verse, then some kind soul shouts it out for her, and she thanks him and continues with the song. But it's the only blip in an otherwise excellent gig. 

After she'd recorded Drama Of Exile in the UK in 1981 Nico went out on the road in earnest. Between 1981 and 1984 she was often supported by various combinations of Manchester musicians. Then, after the recording of Camera Obscura in 1985 the band was pared down to percussion and keyboards, as heard on Live In Tokyo, Behind the Iron Curtain and loads of other semi legit albums.

I recently got hold of a Nico gig from Basel in December 1986. Here the band is Eric Random's Bedlamites. I was surprised when I first heard this recording as I'd been under the impression that the Bedlamites were a percussion ensemble, frequently playing found instruments, banging bin lids and iron bars etc. Almost like a Mancunian pound shop version of Einstürzende Neubauten (and yes I did have to look up how to spell that!). This could have made for a fascinating experience. Well, maybe the Bedlamites did do that sometimes, but when backing Nico they're far more like a slick lounge band. Which is very, very odd. So tracks like "Purple Lips" are graced with a smoochy saxophone and a polite shuffle, more suited to a Sinatra type late night bar. "I'll Be Your Mirror" starts with a gently swinging beat and bouncy bass, then utterly falls apart when Nico starts singing and is totally at odds with the band. Different speed, timing, phrasing, everything! They do rally and try their best to match the rhythm section to Nico's own peculiar idea of rhythm but it never quite recovers to be honest. Which is a shame as "Mirror" was very rarely played live by Nico. 

Another rarity from this show is the "Eulogy To Lenny Bruce" ('I've lost a friend, and I don't know why…') which, as far as I can tell, was only ever played live during this short European run of shows in late 1986. This is far better than "I'll Be Your Mirror" as Nico sings her sad song accompanied only by some appropriately sparse guitar notes. Unsurprisingly the best part of the show is the middle section when the band leave the stage entirely and Nico mournfully plays "Frozen Warnings" and "The Falconer" all alone.  

No matter how they tried to dress up Nico's stage shows, with whatever musicians and instruments, she was always at her most compelling and commanding when sat at the harmonium, alone in the candlelight.   

suede - bloodsports

After a chance encounter with "For The Strangers" from Suede's 2013 album Bloodsports, I was reminded that I'd not played this record all that much, as it was unfortunately issued around the same time as Bowie's The Next Day and then somehow got a bit overlooked last year.  

Bloodsports (and the 8 extra tracks that were issued as b-sides or whatever they are called in these digital times) basically give us enough songs for a double album. And generally it's darned fine stuff.

 

It's Suede, sounding just like Suede. Nothing terribly new, or experimental, just big riffs, big choruses, lotsa swagger and fire and pouting and whooo-hooooing. The intention for the album was to create a record chock full of potential Suede singles. This is achieved admirably, but perhaps this is also the only real downside to the album too - as it ends up being perhaps a little bit much. After side one (and it's definitely an album with two sides) I can't help wishing that they'd dialled it back just a touch - the songs are terrific, the passion is there, everyone's having a great time but it's perhaps a little too frantic, too busy. Some of the tracks might have worked better if they'd left off that extra guitar overdub, if they'd calmed down the drumming, if Brett had reigned himself in a tad.

This may seem a little odd, as the last thing you'd want is Suede phoning in their performances, but in trying to recreate the power of the debut album or the pop/rock sensibility of Coming Up, it seems that Suede are trying a little too hard. This would be a better album with everything turned up to just 9, not 11 - same songs, same performances even, but just a little more restraint. 

Interestingly the b-sides are generally calmer, more reflective and more varied in their approach - with less pressure on the band to recreate that Suede sound after ten years away, they've come up with, arguably, better songs than those that were chosen for the album.  

A new album is being worked on at the moment and early indications are that, with Bloodsports having re-established Suede as ongoing band, this time the songs are more experimental, longer, and more far-reaching. This, in my mind anyway, has got to be a good thing.  

I love Suede, always have, and probably always will, and regardless of my comments above, Bloodsports is a very worthy addition to their catalogue. Arguably their best album since Bernard Butler left. Really.

 

it's kraftwerk jim, but not as we know it...

I recently came across a Kraftwerk gig from nearly 41 years ago, 25/01/74 - a long lost concert, never bootlegged before, that was recently rebroadcast in spiffing quality on German radio.

It was originally recorded for a radio show called "Avantgarde Und Pop", which I think pretty much sums up Kraftwerk. It pre-dates the recording of Autobahn by some months and finds Kraftwerk playing tracks from their first three albums but with an increasingly mechanical beat. This is primarily due to recent recruit Wolfgang Flur and the knitting needle / metal plate electronic percussion that he and Florian had developed in late 1973.

Also in the band - Klaus Roeder on guitar and violin, which gives some of the tracks a weirdly dreamy quality. Florian is still breathily playing his electrified flute and Ralf is in charge of the electronics.  

The first three Kraftwerk albums rarely sound like the band we know from Autobahn onwards. The massive leap in tech, in sound, in compositional approach, between Ralf Und Florian in 1973 and Autobahn in 1974 is almost inexplicable based solely on the records. But this gig sort of shows the band in transition. Whilst they are still playing the older, more freeform pieces there is a new, more regimented approach. No longer are Kraftwerk really improvising, instead they are nailing down the melodies, the rhythms, the essence of the band, and gently hammering it into a form that would, just a few months later, create the mechanised, factory-honed "Autobahn". 

For a long time I've had a gig from the summer of 1974, after the Autobahn album has been finished (and they play a version of the title track that runs for over 40 minutes!) - it's primitive for sure, but allowing for the valves and chunky wires and knitting needles and everything, it's still recognisable as the Kraftwerk that's touring today. But this gig is something else. And it's brilliant to have it in such wonderful quality.

the shutov assembly - brian eno

I have loads of ambient albums by Brian Eno, most of which are designed to be played very quietly, some almost at the very threshold of listening. But last night I played The Shutov Assembly through headphones, and turned up the volume. And, some of it actually works rather well when played loud.

Some of the tracks are really bassy, but the main thing you notice is how much detail is present, detail that you entirely miss when listening to this music passively. The other thing I realized is that surely much of The Shutov Assembly actually dates from much earlier than the 1992 release date.

Although the track titles all relate to places where Eno had set up audio/visual Installations in the 1980s and early 90s, virtually none of the music, bar “Ikekuburo”, was actually used in those installations. Instead most of the pieces, it sounds to me, appear to date from the early / mid 1980s and many closely resemble the Apollo tracks in sound and construction.

About half of the Shutov tracks had previously appeared on the 1989 promo album Textures (although they all had alternative titles on that record). For example the opening Shutov track “Triennale” was entitled “Planet Dawn” on Textures which is a better title for a piece that really does sound like an Apollo leftover.

“Lanzarote” was previously available in 1984 as the flexi disc only rarity “Glint (East Of Woodbridge)”, so it’s clear that the Shutov titles are pretty irrelevant, and this is something of a shame, as most Eno music is usually titled so well, so descriptively, that to have these bland titles named solely after places, despite the lack of relevance, seems rather disappointing.

Anyway, the music is, on the whole, very very good. And I especially like the extremely pretty closing “Cavallino”.

 

rambling thoughts - rolled gold

I recently played a chunk of Rolled Gold (a marvellous compilation of the best Rolling Stones songs from the 1960s). What a band, what songs, what attitude!!!

Early Stones songs walk, or should that be strut, a fine line between politeness and all out snarly swaggering.

Even really early stuff like “Tell Me” seems a little subversive for all it’s clean production and nice playing. Tracks like “Around and Around” almost catch fire, but maintain a weird air of restraint as if the producers just had to hold the band back for fear of scaring the Great British Public.

But then “The Last Time” hints at what’s to come, and then “Satisfaction” utterly throws caution to the wind and the Stones never looked back. Simply brilliant.

My favourite – “Have You Seen Your Mother Baby, Standing In The Shadows” which not only has a wonderful title but is quite bonkers, has oodles of feedback and distortion, and then all that loopy brass too.

tim bowness / henry fool at the borderline 11/07/14

What a wonderful evening. 

The Borderline holds perhaps 175 people so it was always going to be an intimate gig, but I was lucky enough to grab a spot leaning on Mike Bearpark's monitor. Couldn't be any closer. 

Matt Stevens opened the proceedings with some truly inventive and entertaining guitar work. Strumming and picking furiously, looping what he's played, and then playing more and more lines over the top of the loops. Terrific stuff. He seemed to enjoy himself and the crowd certainly did. 

Two of Italy's nosound were up next ('the best two', laughed Giancarlo at one point). With just washes of keyboards and Paolo's gentle acoustic guitar (plus a couple of instances of blindingly liquid electric guitar solos from Giancarlo) the duo cherrypicked a good half a dozen tracks from the excellent nosound catalogue. Well worth watching.

Then it was time for what Tim later called a sort of Frankenstein band - Tim Bowness and Henry Fool Featuring Colin Edwin - not a name that easily trips off the tongue! The tiny stage had to cope with Colin's monster bass, Myke Clifford's sax and flutes, Mike Bearpark's guitar and effects, Stephen Bennett's two tiered keyboards and Andrew Booker's supremely shiny drum kit (bass drum adorned with Henry Fool artwork - 'that's the stage set' laughed Tim). It was a bit of a squash. Tim Bowness was something like the still centre of the storm. He would easily draw the audience's attention when he was singing, his voice strong and deeply affecting, but during the musical passages and instrumentals I felt he seemed almost to melt into the background, something I suspect he'd be rather pleased about.

They opened with the thunderous tribal drumming of "The Warm Up Man Forever". I can't remember the exact set list but a storming "Time Travel In Texas" was somewhere near the start, and also quite early on in the set was one of many highlights, "Smiler At 50", one of the best tracks on Tim's new album Abandoned Dancehall Dreams and one of the very best songs I've heard in ages. The coda was immense, apocalyptic and extraordinary. The first Henry Fool album contained a song called "Judy's On The Brink" which was played tonight with the words altered to make it a prequel to the Smiler tracks. 'See how much more misery we can inflict on her', explained Tim. The band played a couple of superb pseudo jazz/rock pieces ('the Brand X revival starts here!') as well as a very unexpected and rocking "Housewives Hooked On Heroin" which Tim laughingly called the least loved No-Man song. Not tonight it wasn't!

For my money the best song of the evening was the gorgeous "Dancing For You" with a stunning guitar solo from Dr Bearpark, and some wonderful squally keyboards from Stephen Bennett. Throughout the gig Myke Clifford's sax and flutes frequently assisted where backing vocals would have been on the record and he did so here. "Dancing For You" is one of the prettiest saddest songs I've ever heard and this live version was just as good as I'd hoped it would be. 

"Mixtaped" closed the main set. Never my favourite No-Man song, but it seemed to work far better in a live setting being both broodingly intense and surprisingly loose and free. For an encore we had a blast through "Poppy Q" and the show ended with a beautiful "Songs Of Distant Summers", complete with an extended percussive coda. It was the perfect conclusion. 

Considering that some in the band have full time jobs (at some of the best Universities in the country!) they are a solidly coherent unit. But they've been playing together on and off for 25 years or so, so perhaps it's no surprise really. It's a shame, though, that they don't perform more in public as they are such a good band, with inventive, musical explorations, and superbly sensitive emotional backings for Tim Bowness' superb sensitive emotional songs.

All in all, a wonderful performance. More please!

neil young - a letter home

Neil Young has a 'new' album out. Sort of. There's been a lot of comment about this one, A Letter Home, as it's one of the oddest records Neil has ever put out.

Neil visited Jack White's record store in Nashville where White has a refurbished 1940s recording booth. This immediately presses the recording onto vinyl and many vintage folk and blues records were recorded in this way, back in the day. Neil apparently loved it - not so much low-fi as no-fi whatsoever - and, contrary old goat that he is, he's recorded his whole album via the booth!

Of course this means that the record is smothered in masses of surface noise, pops, crackles and clicks, and at times you can hear the wobbly nature of the vinyl, as the songs warble and flutter. It does really sound like an old 1940s record, thin, reedy, crackly, like a voice from beyond the grave. However, I'm not sure that this is such a good thing. Recording technology has moved on for a reason.

A Letter Home contains just covers of old folk / rock tracks (Dylan, Springsteen, Jansch, Lightfoot, Willie Nelson, the Everly Brothers are all represented) and all are lovely performances, first takes, just Neil the guitar and harmonica (and on a couple of songs, Jack White also pounding away on a piano). And whilst the old fashioned recording does have an undeniable, though weird, charm, I have a feeling that the antique sound will get very annoying after a couple of listens. Which is a shame, as Neil is on fine form and is clearly having a ball, and there's a jaunty, fun mood to many of the tracks. I'd argue that all of these songs deserve to be heard in a better recording.

But this is Neil Young. Inexplicable swerves are his speciality. He's been banging on recently about PONO - a new full fat, totally non-lossless, portable, digital music format. He wants it to rival iTunes, and reckons that the quality it delivers is second to none. Apparently, the next volume of The Archives will not include Blu-Ray (like the last set) but to get the really high-end stuff you'll have to get PONO. Then, just as he's pushing PONO and top sound quality as hard as he can, he releases the lowest-fi album made by anyone in the last 60 years!

Apparently there's also a box set version (though what on earth that includes is anyone's guess - a wax cylinder? An old banjo and a rocking chair so you can create your own version?)

Gotta love Neil, but out of all the weird things he's done (and that's not a short list either!) this has to be one the weirdest ever!

it's all one song

Whilst I've often heard Neil Young's semi-ironic comment about his music - "it's all one song" - today I had this proved to me once and for all.

With the iPod switched to shuffle it decided to treat me to three Neil Young and Crazy Horse songs in a row.

 

First up - "Love To Burn" from 1991's cracking live album Weld. 10 minutes of grunging Horse magic.

Then "Ramada Inn" live at the O2 when I was there last summer. Nearly 20 minutes of grunging Horse magic.

Finally, "Powderfinger" from 1978's Live Rust. 6 minutes of grunging Horse magic.

 

All three tracks are carved from the same massive Rock, all three tracks were clearly rehearsed in the same dusty ol' barn, all have the same old fashioned approach to songwriting, keeping it simple, getting some cool harmonies in there and letting the song rock itself out.

And all three could easily have come from the same concert, despite 35 years separating the earliest and the latest. There is frankly no difference in sound, in instrumentation, even in Neil's voice. Some singers lose a lot of their range as the get older, but, marvellously, Neil Young's voice remains exactly the same. And the Horse are a wonderfully consistent band. They know their sound, no-one else plays like them, so they'll doggedly stick to what they know and keep on playing. And playing. 

 

And playing.

 

It's all one song...

eno / hyde - someday world

There's a new album from Brian Eno and Karl Hyde - Someday World.

And it's terrific.

Lots of quirky, jumpy tunes, filled with busy percussion, weird guitar sounds, quirky keyboard sounds, just loads going on to grab and hold your interest. Karl takes most of the lead vocals, but I rather like his voice - and his 2012 album Edgeland is both well worth getting, and is also something of a precursor to Someday World, although generally rather more tranquil.

Most of the songs here, and they are all songs, began as Brian's Beginnings. He reckons he has thousands of interesting beginnings of songs all stored in his archive, but doesn't know how to end them. This is the same process that he went through with David Byrne a few years ago. He sent Byrne loads of beginnings of tracks and Byrne finished them off. That album was recorded by sending files across the ocean, and DB and BE didn't actually meet up until the very end. This time however, once Karl had selected suitable tracks Eno and Hyde and a small band got together in Eno's studio to work them up into actual songs, with real musicians contributing as a band and vocals / lyrics being created on the spot. It does actually sound quite a 'live' record in places, which makes a nice change.

Interesting bunch of musicians on this record too - some old Eno hands like Leo Abrahams and Nell Catchpole, charmingly daughter Darla Eno sings backing vocals and the ever wonderful Andy Mackay contributes saxophone on a couple of songs (though the busy mix doesn't really allow for Andy to sound terribly Mackay-like, which is a shame). However, the main collaborator with Brain and Karl was 20 year old Fred Gibson - Eno met him a few years ago when a friend brought his son and his mate Fred round to Eno's studio. Very quickly Eno realised that Fred knew more about many of Eno's computer programs than Eno himself did. Fred apparently has a huge archive of unreleased tracks (just like Eno) and Eno reckons they are very original and unusual. So Eno co-produced the record with Fred Gibson! Not bad for a 20 year old.

There's a couple of weaker tracks, but on the whole the album is absolutely top. Some of the songs take a few spins to worm their way into your brain, but once there, they really stick. "Strip It Down" is my current favourite, especially the instrumental part that kicks in about a minute from the end. Gorgeous stuff. "Who Rings The Bell" is another that really wraps it's tune around your brain. "The Satellites" and "Daddy's Car" are a stunning one-two punch to open the album, but the record closes with an equally strong piece called "To Us All" which is lovely, and one of the most gentle tracks here. Most of the songs are more frantic, busy, bustling, ever shifting musical landscapes, with constantly twisty-turny vocals and unexpected changes of direction. For example "When I Built This World" starts off all stately and grand with a vocodered Eno vocal then shifts up a gear in the middle section and gets kinda funky.

I bought the 2cd special edition, but be warned - this extra disc only contains 4 tracks, a total of just 15 minutes. And the first two tracks are rather throwaway. But the final one, "Titian Bekh", is a lovely calm ballad of a piece. It's one of those tracks that makes little impression on first listening, but is rapidly climbing up my list of favourites every time I hear it.

All in all, it's a very impressive album, and one which welcomes a lot of plays.

They played a session for Lauren Laverne on BBC 6 Music recently, which proved that they could easily take this album on the road if they so wished. The tracks they performed sounded terrific live - "Do you have any plans to tour this album?" asked Lauren. "We have lots of plans", replied Brian, "there's always lots of plans…" but he wouldn't be any more specific than that. It sounded, sadly, most unlikely that there would be any live shows, which is a shame, but not surprising.  

Also a cracking performance on Later... with Jools Holland this week. With a band this good, they really should tour properly.  

scott walker top ten

So today's Guardian has a Top Ten Scott Walker songs.

 

http://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2014/mar/05/10-of-the-best-scott-walker

 

They're all good songs, but 10 of the best that Scott's ever been involved with?

I beg to differ.

The startling omission of anything from Scott 3 or Tilt is remarkable. And clearly wrong.

Here's my ten.

1. "My Ship Is Coming In" - one of the few optimistic Walker Brothers' songs. It also has one of the most stirring choruses ever written and Scott (and John) sing the heck out of it. The fade out is superb, as they both start improvising a bit with the words.

2. "Mrs Murphy" - while "Archangel" is superb, it's "Mrs Murphy" that is surely the pinnacle of Scott's kitchen sink dramas. "Poor Mr Johnson, being married to a wife... who should be caged". The whole thing is fantastic, the deftly drawn characters, the gossip, the scandal, but it's the sheer relish in Scott's voice as he sings "should be caged" which is the icing on the cake for me.

3. "Such A Small Love" - arguably my favourite ever Scott song. The strings, the voice, the aching fatalistic romanticism of it all, the way he conveys SO much emotion in the final line "such a small love, such... a little... tear..." 

4. "Humphrey Plugg" - which fights "Mrs Murphy" for the best sixties' vignette. I adore the whole story of this song, the way that "pavements of poets will write that I died in nine angels arms, and they all were smiling". Humphrey's flights of fancy are marvellously contrasted with the mundane (Dr Martin and I both love the way Scott sings of "the telly"). 

5. "Big Louise". Was there ever a sadder description of a weary, worn out person than "she's a haunted house, whose windows are all broken"? The arrangement on this song is amazing. There's been nothing like it, ever. Scott's vocal is brilliant too, even more than usual.

6. "Boy Child" - continues the mood of "Big Louise", but takes it into even more abstract territory. Utterly beautiful. How can this be missed out?

7. "The Electrician" is the only choice I'd agree with. Not only does it break new sonic ground, but it's a sweepingly lovely track too, despite the nightmarish visions of the lyrics.  

8. "Rawhide" - a song that begins with hesitant cowbells and the swooping vocal "This is how you disappear" - that's brilliant. Scott reinvented himself totally with this album, going way beyond the weirdness of Nite Flights. At least Nite Flights had recognisable touchstones (Scott kept playing "Heroes" to everyone, saying he wanted that sort of sound) but Climate Of Hunter went out into a whole new world, a world inhabited by no-one but Scott.

9. "Farmer In The City" - how could this be missed out of any list of Scott Walker essentials? I mean really! This is a song that still has the capacity to make me cry, no matter how many times I've now heard it. It's devastatingly beautiful, a genuine work of astonishing art.

I can't pick anything from The Drift or Bish Bosch because both albums, to me at least, need to be played in their entirety to get the full effect. I agree with the Guardian that "Clara" is amazing, but as a stand alone track its full effect is lessened. When the whole album is played it is an incredible part of the sequence. Bish Bosch has only received about 4 complete plays since I got it. I just can't bring myself to play it - when I do, I'm surprised by the sheer amount of warped humour, but listening to the record takes a mighty effort.  

So my tenth is a sideways step:

10. "Scope J" from Ute Lemper's album Punishing Kiss. I would LOVE to hear Scott's vocal on this track, but even without his distinctive voice it's totally a Scott song. Written by Scott, played by his band, it's a wonderful, baffling, intriguing track. And that's how the best songs should be. 

metallic ko - iggy & the stooges celebrate valentine's day...

Valentine's Day - Love is in the air. And on my iPod I'm playing Iggy and the Stooges' last stand as documented on Metallic KO. Who said I wasn't romantic?

 

 

This low-fi / high energy album was mostly recorded at their last gig (until 2003) at the Michigan Palace on February 9th 1974. I'm just a few days out for the 40th anniversary of this incredible show.

It's a legendary gig, but not for the music that was played that night, which does not really show the full power of this band at all, rather for the drama that surrounded it.

 

The background story surrounding this gig is well known - a local biker gang has been causing trouble at Detroit gigs for some time. A few days before the gig Iggy is interviewed on a Detroit radio show, and (in retrospect, very foolishly) dares the gang to show up at the Michigan Palace gig and 'do your worst'. Predictably they do (show up, and do their worst). Armed with all manner of debris to throw at the stage the gang begins the barrage right from the start of the gig. 

Ron Asheton wears his German army helmet for protection, James Williamson skulks at the back of the stage in the shadows, trying not to be seen, Iggy has to be even more fleet-footed across the stage than usual. The two Scotts (Asheton and Thurston) are literally sitting ducks behind drums and piano. Trying to dodge missiles causes Scotty A to lose his way during "Rich Bitch" and the whole song nearly derails completely.

At first Iggy seems defiantly unbothered by the violence and continues to amuse himself baiting the crowd and especially the bikers, but halfway through the set the Stooges have had enough. "Oh there's two guys left the stage" announces Iggy, actually sounding a little dismayed, "we're all gonna have to leave, see ya later".

After a few minutes respite Iggy somehow persuaded the band to return but they were met with a further hail. Even Iggy couldn't believe it and his comments to the crowd are far more subdued after they return to the stage. The band agree to play just one more song, a final, weary, ragged "Louie Louie", which grinds to a halt as light bulbs hit James' guitar and he walks off.

The Stooges had a handful of dates lined up for the rest of February but two days later Iggy called Ron to say that he simply doesn't want to play anymore. The Stooges are finally over.

But they weren't. Who'd have thought that in 2003 the nucleus of the band - Iggy and the Asheton brothers - would reunite? The sad death of Ron Asheton in 2009 didn't even stop the Stooges. James Williamson took early retirement from his senior corporate job at Sony. Despite not having played guitar since 1980 he rehearsed furiously and rejoined the band. And so, 40 years after their 'final' gig, most of the Stooges are still going strong.

 

What a band!

scott walker in the 1970s

After his run of brilliant 1960s records Scott Walker seemed to give up songwriting for most of the 1970s. His voice was still strong, always impressive, but there's an over-riding feeling that Scott was simply going through the motions.

 

Having said that there are some gems to be found. These early 1970s albums are mostly unloved and overlooked for a fairly good reason – on the whole they are very much the poor relations of Scotts 1 – 4 and are generally MOR slush and/or oddly anaemic soft country.

1972’s The Moviegoer is arguably the best. As the title suggests the tracks are all Scott’s interpretations of songs from film soundtracks, and on the whole they’re pretty good. We still have the wonderful Johnny Franz in charge of the strings and orchestral arrangements, and the overall sound isn’t too far removed from the lushness of Scott 3. We don’t have any Scott originals of course, which is a terrible shame, but his vocals are superb, he sounds involved and committed and in general the standard is at least as high as ‘Til The Band Comes In. The opening "This Way Mary" is simply gorgeous and "The Ballad of Sacco and Vanzetti" is a terrific Western infused number. All in all, it’s a far better album than its reputation suggests.

By contrast 1973’s Any Day Now is probably the weakest. It’s not terrible, but there’s little that really stands out. The title track is all forced jollity which simply doesn’t work, and "Maria Bethania" is perhaps the worst track with Scott’s name on it - he sings in a weirdly cod-Jamaican accent which is hugely misguided. Things improve with the moody "Cowboy", a Randy Newman song that Scott interprets well, and towards the end of the record we have two tracks (Jimmy Webb’s "If Ships Were Made To Sail" and a lovely song called "We Could Be Flying") that hint at past glories with intriguing string arrangements and a more committed vocal. But the rest of the album is dominated by bored sounding covers of songs like "Ain’t No Sunshine" and "David Gates’ "If" – and in fact Telly (Kojak) Savalas actually did a better version a year or so later, which kind of demonstrates how poor Scott’s version is…

Scott put out another album later in 1973 – the country influenced Stretch. It’s a better album, and Scott seems keener on these country songs, but the song arrangements are sadly dull and ultimately rather forgettable, with only Scott’s peerless vocals to recommend them. Best track – a lovely version of another Randy Newman song, "Just One Smile", which reminds the listener just what a tremendous singer Scott is, while at the same time reminding the listener of how wasted this tremendous voice is, on such blandly presented material.

In 1974 we had another country styled album – We Had It All at least tried something new. Scott had discovered an up and coming country singer called Billy Joe Shaver, and four of the new album’s songs were by him. But Scott, being lazy, didn’t record the new songs until summer 1974, by which time Waylon Jennings, a man with infinitely bigger Country credentials, had issued an album of Shaver’s songs (including all the ones that Scott had chosen) called Honky Tonk Heroes. By the time of its release We Had It All simply came across as a poor man’s version of the very successful Waylon Jennings album, saddled with syrupy arrangements and uninteresting instrumentation. However, Scott still manages to rise above the blandness with a lovely version of Gordon Lightfoot’s standard "Sundown" and on all the songs his vocals are just perfect.

 

After this of course he rejoined John and Gary Walker in 1975 for the No Regrets album – an album with basically one staggeringly good song and a bunch of really weak filler. The sheer power of the superb title track bludgeons the rest of the album into the dirt. They followed this a year later with Lines which was generally a better overall record, though with no real standout tracks.

 

And then, just as it looked like the Walker Brothers would fade out into ignominious obscurity they issued the bizarre Nite Flights in 1978. For the first time in ages the album was newly composed: four supremely dull John Walker songs, two bland Gary Walker songs and four new Scott Walker tracks of astounding originality.

 

The new Scott tracks were like nothing he'd ever written before. Taking the sound of Bowie's "Heroes" as a starting point, Scott's songs for Nite Flights are startlingly futuristic. Gone is the cloying sentimentality of the past, gone are the romantic strings, gone is that swoonsome baritone voice. Instead we have harsh guitars, pounding drums, a foghorn of a vocal style and lyrics that are, frankly scary. The title track is a nightmarish melange of visceral imagery - "the dark dug up by dogs / the stitches torn and broke / the raw meat fist - you choke" - what it all means is anyone's guess, but it creates terrifying mood. This was a whole new Scott Walker, uncompromising, doing things entirely his own way. It sets the template for much of the rest of Scott’s career.

 

The crowning glory of Scott's four songs is "The Electrician" - musically it switches from high shimmering strings which create an extremely uneasy air, to an incongruous mariachi sound in the middle of the song. The vocal is assured, confident and commanding. The lyrics, when they can be deciphered at all, seem to concern torture in South America. It's both utterly beautiful and absolutely terrifying - a description that can be used for virtually every track in Scott's later career.  

 

An EP of just the brilliant Scott tracks was issued alongside the album, and - sorry John and Gary - this is really all you need. 

magic & loss - lou reed / avenue b - iggy pop

Further to my list of Lou Reed favourites I forgot to mention that one of my Reed Rediscoveries has been his 1992 album Magic And Loss. It's a series of songs about ageing and death, in places reflecting directly on the deaths of a couple of his close friends. 

It's an album that really didn't grab me when it was first released. I was only 25, and, I suppose, too young to fully comprehend what Lou was singing about. Back then, to me the album was something of a downer, sung by a man who was only 50 but was clearly looking ahead and seeing darker times, facing up to his mortality. It's not something you want to consider at 25. And so it's an album that has been very rarely played since. But now, perhaps alarmingly, it all makes a lot more sense to me. The moods, the emotions, the whole approach - now I can see where he's coming from, and where he's going, too. The title track concludes the album in a wonderfully moving manner, and ends with the utterly brilliant line:

"There's a little magic in everything, and then some loss, to even things out."

And frankly I never heard a truer statement.  

Magic And Loss prompted me to dig out another album that reflects heavily on ageing and loss, Iggy Pop's Avenue B. In 1998 Iggy found himself alone for the first time in years. His wife had left the previous year, and Iggy, then hitting 50, had embarked on some ill-judged affairs with much younger women. None of which brought him happiness, just more grief. So he retired to his apartment on Avenue B in New York, called in a couple of musician friends and recorded Avenue B, a predominantly acoustic album (because much of it was recorded in either his apartment or his guitarist's apartment and they couldn't turn things up or the neighbours would've complained!) Many of the songs were autobiographical, and were interspersed with instrumental passages over which Iggy would intone a few short narratives. The extremely moody opening one goes:

It was in the winter of my fiftieth year when it hit me.
I was really alone.
And there wasn't a hell a lot of time left.
Every laugh and touch that I could get became more important.
Strangely, I became more bookish, and my home and study meant more to me as I considered the circumstances of my death. 
I wanted to find a balance between joy and dignity on my way out.
Above all, I didn't want to take any more shit.
Not from anybody.

Interestingly, I 'got' this album immediately. I was 32 when it was issued, but the ageing process and the loss of youth, looks and energy that Iggy touched on seemed somewhat more relevant to me than Lou's requiems to dead friends had seemed, just seven years earlier. I, too, have become more bookish as I've got older, and I'm also becoming more determined not to take any more shit - not from anybody.