Funkadelic Revelations
Wednesday, September 21st 2005
I've just had one of those weird moments when you suddenly find out where a particular piece of music is sourced from. It was like the moment when I found out that the closing music from Steve Wright's Radio 1 (now Radio 2) show was in fact the final minute or so of Glen Campbell's version of Wichita Lineman.
Chris Morris (Brass Eye, Day Today etc) used to have a wonderful show on Radio 1 about 1994. He and Peter Baynham used to play lots of great records in between some very funny comedy stuff. Anyway, the music bed that they had underneath them at the start of the show was this repeating keyboard riff played over some wah-wah guitar. I just put on the Funkadelic album 'America Eats It's Young' and what made up the first two or three minutes of the first track 'You Hit The Nail On The Head'. That exact same keyboard riff and wah-wah guitar. Cool.
It's worth searching online for those Radio 1 shows which should be readily available for download. If you don't want a full show look for Chris Morris's Pixies parody or REM and their hitherto unknown Japanese advert for whale meat. As spot on as the 'Uzi Lover' segment from the Day Today.
1 Comments, category: listening, link: permanent
Mercury Music Prize
Wednesday, September 7th 2005
So that was the Mercury Prize for another year and I don't think I remember the audience being so genuinely pleased for a winner before. Apart from maybe the Kaiser Chiefs who's grins looked a bit forced.
There were quite a few of the albums on the shortlist that I enjoyed this year so it was actually worthwhile watching live on BBC4. The Kaiser Chiefs kicked things off playing I Predict A Riot. A difficult thing to do opening this kind of event where you're playing to your peers and a bunch of industry suits. They're not exactly going to be up and pogoing are they? Still they made a decent fist of it. Their albums not bad though maybe a little one note over the piece. I feel a bit tired by the time it gets the end like I just want them to calm down a bit. Unlike them I didn't think they deserved to win and didn't think they would.
M.I.A. was there but disappointingly didn't perform. I've never seen a performance of hers and I was curious to hear it though they did show clips from a couple of promos I'd never seen. The album is great though and this would have been my tip for the prize had I been putting money on.
The Magic Numbers came on and did what they do and did it well though the bass should have been higher in the mix for full enjoyment. It's a good fun album but there were better records on the shortlist (though not many). I'm glad they're there and it's never a chore to watch them on stage but I hope they stretch themselves on the followup as I fear a boredom factor setting in.
Bloc Party's Silent Alarm I only got recently and haven't given it a fair go though their performance tonight didn't grab me.
Coldplay took the piss on their video piece and had no chance of winning. They played the 'Fix You' video and time slowed to crawl as...
Hard-Fi passed me by as I was out of the room. I have the album unlistened but they've never struck me as being very interesting though I'll give them a fair listen when I get the time.
KT Tunstall I like, she seems pretty grounded and for a female singer songwriter appears to be doing something slightly different from either the baring flesh for success route or the anaemic Didoesque route. Quite impressive solo live performance as well using pedals to layer up backing vocals and a rhythm bed. There is the suspicion in my mind that she's heading in slightly too rootsy a direction for my taste though.
Maximo Park - always got the impression they were strictly second division. Surprised to find them here and made no impact on me.
Polar Bear made an impact though. Not least for the drummers hair which deserved an award on it's own. They were never going to win being the jazz entry but I'm curious to investigate further given their performance here (though I suspect I may love them in short doses rather than over a full album). The drummer is in Acoustic Ladyland who gave a brilliant performance on Later a couple of months ago. At first I thought that they had changed their name and this was the same band but apparently not. Nice addition of computer game effects as well played on a console joypad.
Seth Lakeman was the folk ambassador and recorded the album in his brother's kitchen for almost no money and more power to him for that. Not my cup of tea though.
The! Go! Team! Would have been good had they won but didn't think they would. Their performance of Huddle Formation here just left me breathless. Not sure they make much sense live if you haven't heard the record, there's just so much going on. They were the perfect way to end the live performances on the night though.
Finally to the winners, Antony and the Johnsons. I felt good they won though before hand I was hoping they wouldn't oddly. This album is an acquired taste and I'm not sure how Antony or the album will stand up to the amount of attention they are going to get now. For me this was a small private record, not a record to be shouted about from the rooftops. I could imagine a lot of people are going to buy this off the back of this prize and only listen to it once but it repays repeat listenings, firstly to get used to his unusual voice and then to appreciate the songs. It was annoying to hear one of the voting panel and the NME editor describing the album and Antony as 'weird' and 'strange' and having disturbing lyrical content. How about beautiful and confessional and emotional as more appropriate descriptions? Needless to say Mr NME didn't see Antony appearing on the cover of his magazine any time soon which tells you a lot about the way that paper has gone in recent times.
Antony seemed genuinely surprised by it all realising how arbitrary the whole process was - "it's kind of like a competition between an orange, a spaceship, a potted plant and a spoon". It's no doubt going to have a huge effect on his sales and indeed a trip to Amazon has just showed him as number 1 on the sales chart. Good luck to him.
0 Comments, category: watching, link: permanent
Dark Materials > The Half-Blood Prince
Monday, September 5th 2005
Rereading Philip Pullman's Dark Materials trilogy it really brought home how one dimensional and unimaginative the last Harry Potter book was. It really is a fantastic trilogy of books and the end of book two ('The Subtle Knife') should be read in private and not on a train so as to hide your tears.
Much of my thoughts on Potter 6 are stated much more eloquently than I ever could by Glenn Mcdonald (who used to write The War Against Silence) here
0 Comments, category: surfing, link: permanent
Curb Your Enthusiasm Season 3
Monday, September 5th 2005
Can Larry David do any wrong? It would appear not.
Just finished watching Season 3 of Curb Your Enthusiasm and, damn if it's not the best one yet (though I haven't seen season 4 yet). I don't know if the inclusion of a season long story arc made the difference but the laugh out loud to hiding behind my hands ratio was definitely in favour of the laughs. The hiding behind your hands problem made this a very much solo pursuit. I don't know anyone else who actually likes it and I would agree it's not always easy to watch, but it's worth the painful moments for the many many moments of comic gold.
A lot of the time I feel sorry for Larry and even sympathise with his position, most of the time he's just acting in a way that he thinks is right and proper, either that or circumstances just conspire against him through no fault of his own ('beloved aunt'). Other times of course he's just got questionable morals. Using the death of your mother as an excuse not only to avoid a series of appointements and dinner invitiations you don't want to keep but also a way to gain sympathy with your wife so she'll have sex with you is not a particularly defendable thing to do. Very funny though.
The series finale goes down as an all time classic and I can't think of any sitcom that has ever had this much swearing in it. You can so tell that this show is on cable.
It would take too long to explain the complicated setup but basically they have hired a chef with Tourette's to work in the restaraunt that Larry has invested in. They find this out too late to sack him and in any case they think he is a holocaust survivor because he has a number tatooed on his left forearm. Of course the kitchen is open plan out to the dining area meaning the whole place hears when the chef has an outburst of swearing. Larry in a show of solidarity (he had seen some high school kids earlier who had shaved their heads in support of a classmate going through chemotherapy and hoped that some day he would be able to make such a gesture) shouts out some curses and the other investors, his wife and eventually the whole restaurant join in - believe me no-one holds back. The look of satisfaction on Larry's face at the good deed he has done is a picture. Only he could get such satisfaction from a restaurant full of people swearing. And the holocaust survivor? It turned out the number on his arm was written in pen - it was his lottery numbers.
LD and indeed the whole cast, we salute you.
0 Comments, category: watching, link: permanent