October audio

Here we go with this month’s goodies….

NINE RAIN – Que Viva Mexico – their soundtrack to the Eisenstein film Que Viva Mexico. Will be off to see them play  it in front of the film in Amsterdam at the beginning of November – can’t wait.

YELLO – Touch – continues their climb out of a fairly uninspired patch – loving the funky and ‘jazzier’ excursions in particular.

MOEBIUS – Kram – altogether fiestier stuff than I was expecting.

GONG – 2032 – well produced, and musically more muscular and engaging than I’d anticipated, although occasionally lyrically cringeworthy – or is my cynicism coming into play here?

Neat Japanese animated video to accompany one of the tracks…

THE RESIDENTS – Hades – download from their Robot Selling Device, apparently a reworking of music that was intended to provide an ‘ambient’ backdrop for the launch of Steve Cerio’s Residents toy figures. Compared to other recent outings, this is abrasive, ‘difficult’ stuff, I can’t imagine how it would have been received.

THE RESIDENTS – el Ano del Muerto – download from their Robot Selling Device, bits and bobs on a vaguely Halloween/Day Of The Dead tip.  A couple of things I don’t recognise, but given that I’ve only given cursory listens to some of their song-based albums in recent years, wouldn’t be at all surprised if I discovered that I have the tracks already. Nice and cheap though.

MACHINEFABRIEK - Rusland (3″) & Fabriek Bakker Fabriek (3″) & Piiptsjilling & Drawn & Pulses And Places – another 5 cds adding fuel to the fire…. has this man never produced a duff release?

and finally, speaking of duff releases…..

DAVID SYLVIAN – Manafon – Nope, sorry, I didn’t get this at all, despite repeated listens.  Loved his last three or four outings, but here the improv instrumentation and his voice seem to inhabit separate universes, with no meeting point. Sold on already.

September stuff

‘Normal’ service resumed after a relatively slow month, so here we go with a real mixed bag….

THE RESIDENTS – Anganok/Anganok Instrumental and Bridegroom Of Blood – mp3 downloads – from the Residents Robot Selling Device, some gems from the vaults. Interesting to hear a ‘non-Residential’ voice in play on the operatic Anganok. BoB compiles gamelan-based exercises from across the Rez discography.  I can hear the sound of scraped barrels approaching in the distance…..

MACHINEFABRIEK – Loops for Voerman 3″cd and Fabriek & Fabriek and Zeeg – another three releases in the bag as my obsessive love affair with the work of the ‘prolific Dutchman’ continues… more on the way…

PERE UBU – Long Live Pere Ubu – challenging, intelligent, burpy. Meisterwerk or curate’s egg? I’m undecided.

GONG – Angels Egg – remastered edition with added tracks, bought in anticipation of their upcoming show in Edinburgh.  Unfortunately, the bass has been brought too much to the fore. Did I ever tell you about the time Steve Hillage taught me how to communicate with a cabbage?

cabbages in animated conversation

onwards….

BROKEN SOCIAL SCENE – Love Will Tear Us Apart – from the soundtrack to The Time Traveler’s Wife, a waltz-time reworking of the Joy Division song, surely now the most covered track of modern times. This one’s on a par with the excellent Gira/Swans version, great stuff.

THE ORB – Baghdad Batteries (Orbsessions Vol. 3) – it’s The Orb – what do you expect? Some updating of their sonic palette though.

HARMONIA & ENO – tracks and traces reissue – classic ’shelved’ session between Harmonia and Eno gets its second issue. The three additional tracks are certainly worth the price of admission, but I’m wondering what else has been done to spruce up this reissue – the whole set feels terribly ‘loud’, with even a modest increase in volume straining my ageing speakers.

VARIOUS ARTISTS/THIS IMMORTAL COIL – The Dark Age Of Love – other artists interpretations of Coil pieces.  Took me a while to get around to delving into this, such is my love for Coil – and my suspicion that these versions might somehow fall prey to the contemporary penchant for folky meandering.  For the most part they feel akin in tone to the originals, although there’s something indefinably not quite ‘right’, perhaps in the airbrushing away of Coil’s perfect imperfections, a dinner-table-ising of the music.

JOHANN JOHANNSSON – And in the endless pause there came the sound of bees – limited edition of his score for short film Varmints. CD was only available at dates on a US tour, but I managed to pick up a copy from Insound. Might be given a full release later this year/early next year.

KRAFTWERK AND THE ELECTRONIC REVOLUTION DVD – a history lesson in prospect for me – I followed Kraftwerk from Autobahn onwards, but haven’t seen any video/film footage from their earlier years. At 3 hours long though, it’ll be a while before I find the time to watch it all.

Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry screenprints – a cautionary tale….

In recent years I’ve successfully curbed my predeliction for purchasing original artworks, limited screenprints and the like… there’s no space left on the walls or shelves, a ******* (what’s the collective noun for packing tubes?) of unhung work fills a corner of one room. Enough, I’d said. Until I get a bigger house.

But……

Oh dear.  I’ve been following the audio activities of Mr. Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry for the best part of 30 years now (I’ve around 100+ albums he appears on in one capacity or another), and have always loved his self-drawn/painted album sleeves and marvelled at his decoration of the Black Ark etc….

So when I discovered not long ago that he’d worked on a series of collaborative art pieces that are now up for sale on-line, I hied myself over to the artist’s website here to check the work out.

Did I like what I saw? Oh yes I did.

Did I like the prices?  Ouch.

The originals aren’t cheap – well, certainly beyond my price range for the foreseeable future -

but a couple of them have been produced as limited edition runs of 50 screenprints, each individually added to by Perry.

And so, dear reader, I hope to be the recipient of a screenprint of this wee beauty in the next few days…….

with apologies to the gallery/artists for my ‘lifting’ this image from the website, I do hope they won’t mind….

And this WILL be finding a framer and precious wall-space.

ADDED 6TH NOVEMBER 2009 – A WARNING!!!

I feel that I reluctantly have to report that I’m having problems with the guy selling the screenprints – and for the moment would recommend that anyone considering purchasing approaches with extreme caution following my experience…

I contacted him by email, chose a print and paid as he suggested using on-line bank transfer direct to his account.  The print took around a month to arrive (not too fussed by that, people are busy) – but when it did, it turned out to be the wrong one – and of a much lower reproduction quality than I’d expected.

So far I’ve emailed the guy twice to try to sort something out (a return/refund) and have received no response at all.  My bank tells me that because I paid by direct bank transfer I’m not protected, so I face a trip to the local Citizen’s Advice Bureau to pursue my rights in this situation.  For the moment, I’m stuck with the wrong print, and am out of pocket.

So, please BEWARE the seller – and if you really must order, insist on using a credit card or Paypal so that if something similar happens to you, you’re covered.

Perhaps I’ve been lucky thus far, but this is the first time I’ve experienced a real problem when buying artworks online – real shame it’s something Perry-related.

If anyone else has a similar experience with this seller, do let me know…..

Will update this as the situation develops and (hopefully) resolves.

August stuff

Wow – unusual that a whole month goes by with minimal audio input, but there’s been the Edinburgh festivals in full swing – and I’ve been to a fair number of events, at the book festival in particular.

So, this is it….

DAVID THOMAS & THE PALE ORCHESTRA – Mirror Man Pt2. – download-only album from Hearpen. I attended a live presentation of Mirror Man as part of Stirling’s Le Weekend festival at some point in 2001/2002 – might well have been this set, but it’s too long ago to recall.

DAVID THOMAS & TWO PALE BOYS – Three Things b/w Life Of Riley – download-only ep from Hearpen consisting of two outtakes, one from the wonderful Meadville CD, the other from 18 Monkeys On A Dead Man’s Chest. You can never have too much 2PB.

July joys

TINARIWEN – Imidiwan: Companions – a less overtly produced, rawer sound than their last couple of albums, but all the crucial elements remain in place. Unusual ambient track at the end which I’ve read was formed when a miked-up guitar was left to the mercy of the desert winds. Seems too involved to be wind and sand alone making that music….

MORITZ VON OSWALD TRIO – Vertical Ascent – Sure I read somewhere a while back that the utterly gorgeous Rhythm & Sound project had reached its end, so I was keenly anticipating this release, particularly having heard that Moritz Von Oswald had suffered a stroke. Great that he’s apparently recovered – but sad to say that in all honesty I can’t say Vertical Ascent was worth the wait. Sure, as expected, it’s adroitly produced – but the overall impression I’m left with is of electro improv jazzy meanderings to little purpose or effect. Only the final of the four tracks (Pattern 4)  delves into the deep dub bliss that I’d hoped might dominate. Worth a few more listens, but it’s unlikely that this is one I’ll be returning to in future.

ON/SYLVAIN CHAUVEAU & HELGE STEN/DEATHPROD – Your Naked Ghost Comes Back At Night – trailed as the great ‘lost’ ambient dark metal album. For my money, not a patch on either The Black Book Of Capitalism or Morals And Dogma (both also recently reissued), but worth returning to as the nights begin to draw in….

DUBBLESTANDART/LEE ‘SCRATCH’ PERRY & ARI UP – Return From Planet Dub – double cd, although the dubs on the first album are so strong that the CD of additional mixes seems almost superfluous. God knows how many Perry CDs I now have (upwards of 80 I think), and I never tire of his voice and ‘raps’, although the instrumental settings on some of the recent outings bearing his name have been relatively unspectacular. No worries here though, Dubblestandart are consistently far enough out there to engage, and this is the strongest set since… oh, that Adrian Sherwood Japanese-only set Upsetter Dub last year. Seems Perry’s having a late flowering….

Encouraged me to seek out…

DUBBLESTANDART – Heavy Heavy Monster Dub & Immigration Dub – two of their past albums. I’d lost track of what’s going on in the world of dub these days – Japan’s Audio Active and Dry & Heavy were the last outfits I paid any real attention to a few years back, both associated with Sherwood.  Thoroughly enjoyable, and make me want to seek out even more. They’re Austrian too – what with these and the recent dub-influenced Tosca album, is there something in the Viennese water supply?

Have just bought tickets to see Dub Syndicate at the Voodoo Rooms at the beginning of August. Just listened to a couple of their old discs and they’re not bearing up too well. Expectations slightly lowered for the show, although I’m sure Adrian Sherwood will be entertaining on the board.

MULATU ASTATKE/THE HELIOCENTRICS – Inspiration Information – Like quite a few others (I’d imagine) I only stumbled across Astatke/Astatqe through the ‘Broken Flowers’ soundtrack – proving, I guess, that a love of Bill Murray can lead you to some strange places. This is certainly at the jazzier end of my usual spectrum of listening, but that’s not a bad thing. What really got me on this release is not Astatke’s contributions (fine though they are), but the spectacular drumming, which brought to mind both Jaki Liebezeit and Tony Allen.

BJORK – Voltaic – archival/live/video spread over two cds and two dvds. Are there many other artists who so carefully milk their work across different iterations? Someone in the house will spend a great deal of time with this, but it’s unlikely to be me.

BRIAN WILSON – That Lucky Old Sun – three quid out of Fopp, can’t go wrong there.

NURSE WITH WOUND – Alice The Goon – cdep – dunno how this one managed to pass me by

June bugs

NURSE WITH WOUND – The Memory Surface - 3-disc edition of The Surveillance Lounge. Dare I say that I’ve come to prefer the NWW who toy more obviously with song and rhythm (Huffin’ Rag Blues being the recent example to cite). Probably heretical to some, but there you go. Great audio journey, but don’t know how often I’ll be returning to it, or the bonus discs.

ALVA NOTO & RYUICHI SAKAMOTO – utp_ (cd, dvd & booklets) – just bought tickets to a ‘Ryuichi Sakamoto at the piano’ solo event at the Queens Hall in Edinburgh in December. I’m sure it’ll be good – but on the strength of this, I’m already sad that Alva Noto won’t be along for the ride. Gorgeous, and cleverly packaged as ever from Raster Noton.

TOM TOM CLUB – Tom Tom Club/Close To The Bone (2cd reissue) - beautifully packaged (good job, Joe) and pleasing to hear again.

MACHINEFABRIEK – Mort Aux Vaches & Slaapzucht & Ranonkel & Gris Gris & Shuffle - a set from 2006, one from 2007, two from 2008, and one from this year continuing my catching up with the activities of Machinefabriek. Ranonkel wins from this batch. Only Shuffle disappoints.

VIEUX FARKA TOURE – fondo – The first of two attempts this month to conjure forth a summery vibe chez nous in face of the persistent cloud, damp and drizzle that marks the Scottish version of the season.

BAABA MAAL – television – My second attempt to… blah blah.

TARWATER – Donne-Moi La Main OST – their first outing for a while, and more song-based than might be typical from film score/soundtracking work

LAURIE ANDERSON – Nothing In My Pockets (book & two cds) – nicely if cheaply packaged diary of audio vignettes. Interesting project, but I began to find Laurie’s telling us what we’re about to hear before we hear it a tad wearing, and the audio snippets themselves are too brief to become immersive ‘events’ in themselves.

THE RESIDENTS – Adobe Disfigured Night - an mp3 download from their new Robot Selling Device site, an early live iteration of their Disfigured Night performance/disc. Crazy. I’m hopeful that more rarities will emerge for download here in due course, my fingers are crossed for an extended Voice Of Midnight instrumental set.

Throbbing Gristle @ Glasgow Tramway

A quick trip along a crowded M8 late yesterday afternoon nearly turned in to a disaster when for reasons unknown (to me anyway) a driver three ahead of me decided to screech to a halt in the fast lane. Ferociously jumping on my brakes and swerving, I avoided whacking the car in front by a whisker – but following drivers weren’t so lucky, and I heard the dull crunch of metal on metal behind me. Perhaps ironically prescient, this crunching echoed a similar sonic palette to early TG.

So, an unnerving start to the evening, attending what might at one time have been a vaguely unnerving concert experience me. Have to confess that waaay back before I’d first heard Throbbing Gristle, their reputation preceded them and I was unsure what to expect and how I’d react.

Same with this evening – but being older and (arguably, I know) wiser, I was uncertain for a different reason. TG as a chicken-in-a-basket retro outfit, albeit at the ‘arty’ end of the spectrum?

The venue was almost full (900 out of 1,000 ticket sold, I heard), with an adjacent MFA degree show viewing in another hall also crowding the foyer. Hard to tell one group from the other, which was encouraging – regulation paramilitary greys/blacks obviously a thing of the past for TG’s current audience.

TG emerged at half past eight for their first set of the evening, an improvised (“this is the first time we’ve done this”) score for a 40 minute short film by Welsh artist Cerith Wyn Evans. Band and artist had previously collaborated on a sound scuplture for the Yokohama Triennale, something I managed to take in on a trip to Japan late last year and found to be the highlight of that overall disappointing show (see earlier blog entry).

Notwithstanding an obvious confluence of intellectual interest in ritual behaviours, there didn’t seem to be much to link the slowly dissolving images of Thai and Japanese festivals with the lugubrious TG jamming accompanying it – material that didn’t seem a million miles away in scope from the Third Mind Movement album the group have released as a recent tour artefact. Not that any of this wasn’t engaging – it certainly was.

a tour artefact, yeserday

A half hour break followed before the band re-emerged for their ‘greatest hits’ set. House lights remained up as Persuasion oozed into being, a welcome opener, and pleasingly clear sound.

I’m not one for spewing set lists (or being able to remember them), but amongst the favourites offered up were Hamburger Lady, Almost A Kiss, What A Day, and a thumping climax with Discipline. No encore.

Not sure what happened to Genesis’ violin playing throughout – either I’ve lost a frequency in my hearing or it was well down in the mix, only occasionally audible.

So, the first TG appearance in “a wee country, but one with a lot of power” (according to Genesis) was a success – no longer (though of course they never were) the ‘wreckers of civilization”, the group maintained admirable levels of power and composure throughout, and confirmed (for me at any rate) that their reactivated sonic questing is well worthy of continued engagement.

Haste ye back.

May stuff

Here’s the merry month of May, in retrospect already……

THROBBING GRISTLE – The Third Mind Movements – released to accompany their US tour – plenty of glutinous jamming/improv. Looking forward to seeing them live for the first time at the Tramway in mid-June.

THE INNER SPACE/CAN – Agilok & Blubbo – ‘lost’ early work from the precursor group to Can. Curiousity value only, at least for me.

TUSSLE – Cream Cuts – modern krautrock from San Francisco (I think). Engaging on a first listen, and they could become something special over the space of a few more discs. A real grower.

MACHINEFABRIEK – Marijn & Weleer - I’m warming to prolific Dutchman Rutger Zudervelt and his bespoke ambient electronickery day by day. Seems I’ve got 40+ discs to catch up with. Ach weel, 3 down, 37 to go…..

BIOSPHERE – Wireless: Live at the Arnolfini, Bristol - Live ‘greatest hits’ set recorded by Chris Watson. Does what it says on the tin.

VARIOUS ARTISTS – Sleepwalk: a selection by Optimo (Espacio) – A groovy Christopherson Coil remix of a track from The Ape Of Naples attracted me to this comp from last year. The rest I either have already or doesn’t quite connect.

CURRENT 93 – Aleph at Hallucinatory Mountain – Bought the costly subscribers’ edition, and sad to say, I wish I hadn’t bothered. Altogether too ‘rocky’ for me, but will probably come into its own with live iterations – not that I’m ever likely to find out.

Threshold Houseboy’s Choir @ Stereo, Glasgow 3rd May 2009

Well?

I was lucky enough to be at a rare Peter Christopherson/Threshold Houseboy’s Choir solo show at Stereo in Glasgow earlier tonight, following an entertaining catch-up dinner with Jo at the venue’s vegan restaurant.

Christopherson mostly ‘played’ stuff from the Amulet Edition, accompanied by projection of a disparate yet entirely appropriate selection of video.

Opening with a lengthy clip from The Thief of Baghdad, there was also variously; a video ‘prayer’ for some Thai boys enjoying themselves; footage of a ceremony in which young trancing Thais attempting to breach an army cordon in order to reach a tattoo artist/priest; some gay mobile phone porn ‘heterosexualised’ by way of solarisation; a Liberace performance; some (mercifully) distressed phone video footage of beheadings that were part of the Thai/Malaysian border conflict; film of ceremonial masked dancing at a Thai royal funeral; and ending with phone video footage of sex acts. A nice lengthy noise-bath improv on ‘Distonto’ – one of the Amulet tracks – accompanied the latter to finish proceedings.

All of this punctuated by Christopherson’s avuncular wit. Waki was very taken with what she described as his very fetching ‘cows-moo’ dressing gown.

From the Threshold House website “Sleazy reserves the right to add an extra disc or mini-dvd to a small number of Amulets he will be selling at solo THBC shows in Europe during May, though IF he does, the extra disc will be also available alone, to include in the Amulet you already bought.”

Was slightly disappointed to discover that the 3″ disc of additional Amulet Edition material didn’t materialise on the merchandise table – not enough time to prepare it, apparently. Ach weel…..

But I did snap up one of an edition of 100 Soisong ‘xAj3z’ promo booklets/folders complete with the new disc. Haven’t read it yet, but it seems to expand around the selection of photos gracing the album pages of the Soisong website.

A good night, and I also heard through the grapevine that there might be a Throbbing Gristle show at the Tramway in Glasgow sometime in June – have to keep my eyes peeled for that.

April showers

This month’s prime listenage…

SOISONG – xAj3z : 060409 - Peter Christopherson & Ivan Pavlov arguably still finding their feet as a duo with their debut album release. Beautifully – if annoyingly – packaged. Not convinced myself as yet that it hangs together as an album, although each track is a wonderful listen. As I type, only two days separate me from a Threshold Houseboy’s Choir show in Glasgow. Can’t wait.

INTRUSION – The Seduction Of Silence - comparisons with a roomier Pole or Rhythm & Sound wouldn’t go amiss here.

TOSCA – No Hassle – having bored with Kruder & Dorfmeister quite a while ago, I only bought this recent Dorfmeister/Huber double set as an audio souvenir of our visit to Wien, and having read reviews suggesting that this lifts itself beyond the trip-hoppy/ambient cliches that K&D became mired in. It does, to an extent.

JAH WOBBLE & THE CHINESE DUB ORCHESTRA – Chinese Dub - finally got around to this, having read so many ecstatic reviews over the past few months. Doesn’t (probably couldn’t really be expected to) live up to the hyperbole on offer in print, but decent.

MARTIENSGOHOME – Abscons Depuis 1996 - ten albums worth of relatively spartan Belgian electro-acoustic improv on a bamboo USB stick housed in a small wooden box – gorgeous design sense, something to treasure as an artefact. Am slowly beginning to work my way through its audio delights.