Marathon over, along with night shifts. Hopefully normal service and a bit of music will resume shortly.
A huge thank you to everyone who helped me raise almost £950 for the Macmillan Nurses. Your kindness and support astounded me, and I take back all those things I said about you.
When Haile Gebrselassie dropped out I briefly thought I might be in with a shout but in the end I was pipped at the post by two Rhinoceroses and a Scooby Doo. Land speed records remained untroubled by my 5 hours and 16 minute finishing time.
Other things I discovered:
1. When a person in the crowd cheers you on by screaming “Come on you great big red pie face” always check behind for giant Cherry Bakewell’s before telling them where they can stick their support.
2. If you wear khaki running shorts and insist on pouring water over your head, the proud picture of you with medal will be slightly ruined by what appears to be a bad incontinence problem.
3. The London Marathon is one of the most amazing life affirming things I’ve ever had the privilege to be part of. All the clichés apply, the atmosphere, the camaraderie, the Elvis impersonators outside East End pubs, and the adrenalin rush as you realise you might… just might… make it to the end.
Thanks again to everyone who contributed. My brief running career is now over, my blogging will resume shortly.
Please forgive the non music post but on Sunday I’m running my first (and last) London marathon.
With 7 weeks training missed due to a severe case of dodgy knees its pretty terrifying but with luck, crowd support and a force 9 wind behind me I might just finish the thing. It would be nice to beat the guy in the full deep sea divers outfit but I’m taking nothing for granted.
There doesn’t appear to be a charity that cares for lanky people with knackered knees into their dotage so thankfully any money raised will go to a far worthier cause.
Macmillan Nurses provide care and support to people affected by cancer. Knowing that making it to the line will help those dying of cancer see out their final days with some dignity will hopefully spur me on over the final miles. More importantly it will make a real difference, even if only a small one, to families who have to deal with losing a loved one to cancer.
Donating through the site is simple, fast and it won’t result in hundreds of emails offering to increase the size of your bank balance or anything else. If you are a UK taxpayer, an extra 28% in tax will be added to your donation at no cost to you.
In a vague attempt at posting some related music I typed in run, jog, knackered, and why did I agree to do this into my ipod. This is what came out:
Survivor - “Eye of the Survivor” (MP3) - totally unnecessary hiphop scratchy version of Rocky’s motivation music
Admitting your weaknesses is the first step to defeating them, or so say the self help books. My problem is Analogue… I just can’t let it go.
A thousand or more vinyl, piles of VHS’s, stacks of Minidiscs (Thanks to Ian for correctly spotting they’re not analogue), and two large boxes of badly labelled cassettes. They are my cultural history, the story of my musical education, but they’re are also very dusty, and a point comes where I either open Walthamstow’s very first museum of defunct audiovisual formats or with a tear in my eye they go to the landfill!
And so to this new weekly feature, a bye bye to my analogue as I reclaim my flat from the unsightly teetering piles of my history. The unkind among you could label the feature “My Old Crap… Your Hard Drive”, but hopefully I’ll operate a bit of quality control, and unearth a few lost classics along the way. The focus of this blog remains firmly on new music, but I’ll be having a weekly shameless wallow in the past too
JUSTIFIED AND ANCIENT
When they weren’t busy torching a million pounds or machine gunning the audience at the Brits, the KLF (and their various alter-ego’s) created music as idiosyncratic and unexpected as their non musical exploits.
As something of a JAM’s collector I thought I knew most of the versions of “What Time Is Love?”, but a tape of Italian house versions given to me by a work mate during a hideous summer working in McDonald’s was always a puzzle.
Of course today digging it out with the power of the internet I’d discovered what it was within 5 minutes. “What Time Is Love?” was so popular across Europe that it spawned at least 18 different cover versions, and The KLF rather than bemoan this, decided instead to gather a few of the best together and release them as “The What Time Is Love Story”. As always with the KLF doubt surround this story with some people claiming that all the versions were actually recorded by the KLF themselves.
While Im at it I cant resist sharing the brilliant Brass Band version taken from “Acid Brass“ an album of brass band cover versions of Acid house classics. The album is worth buying for the “Voodoo Ray” cover alone.
I did have a freshly converted VHS to share, but then I stumbled across this De La Soul press kit/MTV feature from 1989 on YouTube, and frankly a bit of vintage daisy age beats everything! Watch and enjoy while I hunt in the loft to see if I can still fit into my “This Is My De La Soul T-shirt” Tshirt.
SOLID STEEL ARCHIVE
Coldcut’s legendary Solid Steel show introduced me to so much of the music I love today, from Fela Kuti to Mark E Smith, they always lived up to their “the broadest beats in london” tagline. I’ve been listening and taping from the KissFM pirate era right up until BBC London pulled the show a few years ago (although its still available online and on radio across the world).
Its probably a bit of a minority interest but I’m going to post an old show every week… well that’s if I can work out any details (I was never any good at marking up my recordings). I’ll also pick out a highlight from the show or top track.
Listening takes me back to the excitement of trying (and often failing) to stay awake till the 1am-3am slot, and the magical musical treasures that tumbled from the speakers each and every week.
Th highlight of this show from sometime in 1991/92 (help?) was a Coldcut remix of “Strobelite Honey” by The Black Sheep, which as far as Im aware never got released. On a later show Matt Black said “record company bullshit” stopped it coming out.
A few gigs and new releases I haven’t had the chance to write up properly.
DAN LE SAC VS. SCROOBIUS PIP
First up a chance to play your part in securing the highest chart placing for a bearded man since ZZ Top hung up their stratocaster’s. The song of the summer ((c) Guardian/Metro/Irish Times etc) “Thou Shalt Always Kill” is finally out for digital download, and Lex have posted the Video plus loads of links to sites who’ll kindly swap you 80p for a pristine MP3. The B-side “Angles” was one of my top tracks of last year too, so get downloading good people
While on the subject of new releases, Robyn’s re-released debut album is also out, with the bonus of the breathtakingly good Kleerup collaboration “With Every Heartbeat”. Its quite simply the best pop album this decade, almost every track sounds like a hit single. If Kylie/Madge released this album they’d have to retire the No.1 album spot, and start counting from No.2.
“Your granny will dance to it at your cousins wedding, slaughtered rugby lads will holler along while pouring beer over their heads, and squadies in Iraq will film their own hilarious video to it (a la Amerillo) featuring an iraqi pow recreating the high note in the middle as they attach diodes to his vernaculars! ”
They’ve also sprinkled a little Rumble Strips magic over the permanently pickled Amy Winehouse, recording a cover and a remix. I think the cover will be on the b-side of Motorcycle, but here’s the Amy remix.
I’ve missed the first day of spring, but its still a good enough reason to share a bit of vintage Tom Lehrer. What better way to spend a beautiful spring day than listening to mine (and Ken Livingstone’s probably) favourite ode to the season “Poisoning Pigeons In The Park“?
No, not the king of rock and roll, but “JV & Elvis” who present a radio show in New York. For reasons best known to themselves they subjected middle of the road indie band “A Brief Smile” to a torrent of faggot, gay, taking it up the *&^% style abuse.
Listen to it… I promise you won’t believe what you’re hearing. The heart sinks to think that people still behave this way in 2007. The most embarrassing part is the member of “A Brief Smile” who remains in the studio struggling to carry on with the interview, and sailing perilously close to disowning his band mate.
Part one of “Listen To This“ saw Jez of Horse Latitudes/Brubekk, and Finger Magazine fame so shell shocked by my selections he started quoting Black Eyed Peas songs. Luckily The Jackson 5 saved the day, and now Jez steps up with 3 of his own choice selections.
HL (JEZ): I think it is telling that Larry Heard AKA Mr Fingers is the first friend on these guy’s myspace page. Talk about wearing your influences on your sleeve…but that’s not a negative, nor is it the sum total of their sound.
It starts with the lush thuds and bumps of a nice mid tempo groove and some old school cascading vocal samples, a sound Chicago would be proud to call its own. But then the bubbles of a wicked analogue-y hook come through. A hook that if you didn’t know any better would make you say “this band should be snapped up by DFA” - and you’d be right.
I chose Classique 2 purely because it had less downloads, and I like to fight for the underdog (some people just call that ‘being contrary’…) Athene rocks hard too, but this one for sheer head-nod-a-bility just pipped it. Thanks to Jaksoul for the nudge in this direction.
MLD: The opening thud thud of the 4:4 house drum, a burbling acid bassline, snatches of twisted vocal samples and I’m in heaven. Even better god’s thrown some classic Chicago house on the turntable.
Rock has been eating itself for 30-40 years now, and similarly this is a dance sound that could’ve been recorded at any point in the last 20 years, but when the source you’re supping from is as delicious as the glorious house sound of Chicago and Detroit, I for one wont be complaining. On the heavily treated hook lines it even sounds like they’ve dragged Inner City’s Paris Grey out of retirement just to provide a 5 word pleading end to the chorus’s “Do… You… Really… Want… Me”.
I’ve only heard a couple of tracks so far but the debut album from Andrew Butler’s Hercules And The Love Affair is already shaping up to be all over those end of year lists. With guest vocals from Antony Hegarty (of “and the Johnson’s” fame) - a man who provided the stand out track on the My Robot friend album last year - and the backing and kudos of DFA its difficult to see how it can fail. Aside from Bjorks mouth-watering new album featuring Timbaland and the Konono No.1 this is probably my most eagerly awaited release of the year (and to think i hadn’t even heard of it 2 weeks ago when Jez’s mail popped into my in box).
HL (JEZ): A human and a piano can be one of the most devastatingly effective conduits of human emotion - bar none. Throw-in a sustain pedal, a tortured soul, and a quartet of strings and I’m practically blind with tears before the music starts!
When you think Cinematic Orchestra you probably think all clever outdoor festivals with beard stroking and silent Russian movies and people who read the Guardian and know more than you about ballet. Me too. The Cinematics went off to the ICA for a while back at the turn of the century and I lost interest. In fact the whole Ninja Tunes operation lost sight of the things that made them legends in the 90s. Sure, everyone has to make a dollar, but you’re not getting mine anymore.
Then this track slid across my desk (how we grow up…I’m not asking the DJ anymore, I’m asking the secretaries…:)) and it is one of the most beautiful tracks I have heard for a long time.
In fact I feel quite spoilt today. This morning I spent listening to Regina Spektor’s ‘Samson’ (seek and find) and now I sit and listen to this. Both tracks borrow heavily from Antony and The Johnson’s, and the tradition goes back before him to Billie Holiday (I’m thinking Strange Fruit) and back further… But a melody is a melody, a hook’s a hook and good lyrics are damn hard to find. Patrick Watson, the Canadian singer, is a perfect match for the music. I trust you will agree.
MLD: As I was both in attendance at the live soundtrack for the Russian silent movie, and by and large have been a Guardian reader most of my life I slightly object to the thrust of Jez’s comments, although I discount myself from the slander on the basis of my lack of beard or ballet knowledge.
Ninjatune have always existed with their feet on the dancefloor but their hands on their beards… that’s their charm. True, sometimes they stray too far into bearded territory, one memorable moment being at the interval to Cinematic Orchestra’s live “Man With A Movie Camera” score, when an wide eyed young man enthused to my girlfriend at the time how “it was breathtaking” only to be informed that she’d slept through the first half so bored had she been (for the record I enjoyed most of it).
2002’s “Everyday” album ranks as one of Ninjatune’s finest releases, if only for Fontello Bass’s tracks, and the colossal genius of Roots Manuva guest spot on “All Things To All Men” so no pressure for the new release then guys!
The fact - and Im afraid it is a fact, not just sloppy journalism - that this track sounds like Coldplay covering Anthony & The Johnson’s has ensured it a tough reception on Ninja’s very own forum. Someone suggested joining a Coldplay noticeboard and posting it as a leaked new track to see how many people noticed it wasn’t Gwynth’s hubby.
When it first leaked late last year I have to admit I wasn’t that impressed either, but once you strip away all the expectation and the music snobbery, and actually LISTEN as George Michael once said without prejudice, what you’re left with is an absolutely beautiful track, that will touch your soul (if you let it)!
Ninjatune have been giving away the radio edit of the track so that’s the one Im sharing. For the full length version complete with sumptuous strings pre-order the album.
HL (JEZ): The Kalimba is a Zimbabwean instrument, a finger piano that makes the most ethereal sound you’ve ever heard. Used to create waves of repetitious trance like sounds, it is as much the sound of today as of when it was created. You can hear it in The Juan Maclean, Lindstrom and Prins Thomas, Joni Mitchell, Nine Inch Nails…and also in Earth Wind and Fire’s fifth album from 1974, ‘Open Our Eyes’.
Ramsey Lewis introduced Maurice White to the instrument when White was working with the Lewis band on the Sun Goddess sessions. White and the whole of EWF had a very Afro-centric roots based approach to soul and funk and this traditional African sound fit right in. I love the fact Maurice sings of how this ancient instrument will help him make “future music“. Damn straight people. This is still future music.
Of course the future for EWF was Boogie Wonderland and massive chart success followed by languishing in dollar bins all across the globe, but hey, in 1974 lots of people were optimistic I had ignored EWF for too long, when I chanced across this track. I think we all have. Head back to the early albums and you’ll uncover some gems. This album alone contains ‘Drum Song’ ‘Devotion’ and ‘Mighty Mighty’. Check it.
MLD: As the saying goes “There’s many a fine tune played on an old piano“, and so its equally true that there’s many a funky tune played on a traditional instrument. Recently I saw Ba Cissoko’s 21 string Kora Harp’s out Hendrix Jimi himself while their drummer played a huge traditional drum that made a great booming noise like an 808 at the bottom of a 30ft well. Now add to that the back catalogue of Earth Wind and Fire, thanks to Maurice White’s love of traditional African instruments (although the Kalimba was sort of “invented” by an Englishman in the 1920’s, based on the traditional Mbira).
“Kalimba Song” takes a very Sly & The Family Stone bassline (”Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)”?) and perfectly mixes in the plucked sound of the Kalimba finger piano. On the basis of this I’ll be hunting down some early EWF asap, although with the exception of the Kalimba solo towards the end I have to ask if the track would be much different if the Kalimba channel on the mixing desk was faded down? (actually that’s a little harsh).
By all accounts Maurice did for the Kalimba what Rolf Harris did for the Wobble board placing it at the heart of the group, all over the early material, and giving it exposure it would never otherwise have achieved (although I can’t find so much as a sniff of Kalimba on Boogie Wonderland). Personally I just love the idea that a group like EWF would release a song about a Southern African finger piano as a single in the US, and reach number 7 in the R&B charts.
