Friday 23 June 2017

It's Friday . . Je Vais En Vacances




This will be our digs for the next fortnight and I cannae wait to get there sometime in the afternoon Sunday. It has been a long time coming and I have been counting down the days for some months now.  We have had quite a lot of shit over the last 6 months, and we are not alone there I know, which will not miraculously dissipate during two weeks in the middle of France but it won't be any worse and the good food and wine may help. I am looking forward to finding out what Jean-Paul and Philippe think about the UK's exit from the European Union.

I've never been the biggest fan of Sasha, or God as he was known by more than a few during the mid 90s but live he was an excellent dj, could build up the vibe and manipulate a crowd, sure he was no Weatherall but nobody was. He also produced some belters of remixes which I was reminded of the other week after listening to his Scene Delete album from last year  and deciding to revisit some of the reworking of other artists material.that I have This one from 1994 of Talk To Me by Hysterix for me is the pick of the bunch and probably one of the highlights of his seminal Renaissance mix from that year that kind of made his name for those who had yet to experience Alexander Paul Coe djing.

Have a good weekend people.

Hysterix - Talk To Me (Sasha's Full Music Master mix)



Thursday 22 June 2017

Medicine



I'm not sure why I haven't featured Daughter before as they are frequently on the turntable and I have often thought that they should be better known than they are (like featuring them on here is going to further that end much!).  I know that Walter has posted them once or twice and rates them quite highly. When I have seen them mentioned,  the article or review usually contains a comparison with The xx which I suppose is quite valid, however there is more to them than that whereas the xx have that sort of electronic feel, Daughter feel more organic with more than a hint of folk now and again in their sound and the distinctive voice of Elena Tonra,

To date they have released two very good albums and quite a few singles and eps. Today's track comes from one of my favourite releases, a US only 10",  The Wild Youth ep from 2011, the trio's second record.

I am not one for watching Channel 5, the likes of CSI, CSI New York, CSI Timbuktu or whatever are not the kind of thing that I get into but a year or so ago I happened to be away with work one Monday night and started watching an episode of Person of Interest which I actually really enjoyed.  So much so that when I was at home the following week I made a point of watching the next episode and then the next and then in the middle of the run the station decided to stop it for some reason. After a couple of weeks I decided to see if I could get the series on DVD and found the first four seasons could be purchased quite reasonably from eBay and the fifth and final one slightly more expensively than the other 4 together. So I decided to buy all 5 and have been watching them from the start for the past couple of months.and a few weeks ago Medicine by Daughter was used to great effect in one episode which got me looking back and remembering that there had been quite a few decent tracks used throughout the series, by the likes of Massive Attack, Mazzy Star, DJ Shadow and funnily enough The xx. The music is mostly very subtly used in the drama, never taking center stage, mostly in the background, sometimes to the fore but always very effectively.

I am still not wholly sure as to why this particular series grabbed me rather than others of note such as Breaking Bad as this kind of vigilante violence, conspiracy theory stuff  isn't really my bag but it did and I thoroughly enjoyed it, so much so that I am at a loss now that I have watched it all, I have been toying with going back to Twin  Peaks but the last time I tried I got bored. I have the feeling that I am not going to get much out of revisiting it. It could be time to binge on Northern Exposure again.

Daughter - Medicine

Wednesday 21 June 2017

Walking With A Stranger



Some of you may have noticed that the posts on here have become somewhat sporadic and if it were possible even shorter than they have been for some tie. There hasn't even been any rants for quite some time even though there have been a huge amount of things to rant about lately. But I really can't find the words, it's not that I can't be bothered with the blog anymore I still want to go on but just can't find the inspiration. At the end of this week I am off for a couple of weeks and hope that after two weeks in south-west France I will have renewed inspiration and a few new ideas to come back with.

Getting back to the music, on Monday I mentioned that I had a song that I thought may have been inspired with a Toast To The Lady. It is unlikely as the Eddie Wilson song is not that well known but there are similarities in the organ sound on both tracks and I find myself wanting to play Waking With A Stranger after a Toast To The Lady or vice versa. Of course it is probably all in my head and you will be thinking "what the fuck are you on about, they sound nothing like each other".

Waking With A Stranger by the Tyrell Corporation came out in 1992 and came to the attention of absolutely bugger all as I think that it is a great record which has featured here before in the early days of the blog when my levels of enthusiasm were a lot higher than at the moment.

The Tyrell Corporation - Waking With A Stranger

Monday 19 June 2017

Toast To The Lady



What seems like a lifetime ago I compiled a tape (a compilation, not a mixtape as no mixing was involved) titled "Table For One" comprised of soul/northern soul break up songs. I know what your thinking, aren't the vast majority of soul songs concerned with the dissolution of romances. Well a heck of a lot of them are. For this tape I wanted to start from the dawning that the affair or whatever was on the road out  through the separation, the anger and finally the acceptance and getting over the whole thing, I can't remember the full track listing at the moment and I don't have have a copy of the tape more's the pity but it did include No One There by Martha Reeves, The Night The Angels Cried. and finished with I Walked Away by Bobby Paris where I imagined the protagonist after just more than the right amount of wine getting up and walking away from his table for one with that " fuck it, I'm fine, she 's the one who will regret it" feeling,  the one that would inevitably be gone the next morning when he was alone with just his hangover for company but at that moment he felt he was "over her".

Toast To The Lady, the flip side of Just Call On Me, released in 1964 on Tollie Records the Vee Jay subsiduary was the inspiration for the said tape. Well that and sitting alone at a table in the Newcastle Malmaison after just the right amount of alcohol. I have posted this song before after sitting listening to it one night and noticing the similarities to Burt Bacharach and Bob Hillard's Any Day Now but when I played it again in the early hours of yesterday morning I could hear a resemblance to another song more of which tomorrow.

Eddie Wilson - Toast To The Lady

Wednesday 14 June 2017

Nothing Can Bring Me Down



We are back to Texas with this week's fuzzed up, sadly virtually unknown Garage classic from Waco to be precise. Strangely this was the Twilighters one and only release which was recorded in a club called the Mark VII which also lent it's name to the label on which the record was released. I don't know anything further about the band or the record, sorry.

The Twilighters - Nothing Can Bring Me Down

Monday 12 June 2017

The Secrets



Know less than usual about this lovely piece of girl group soul. It was released on the Omen label, a subsidiary of A&M Records in 1966 and has been booted a couple of times and mines most probably is one of those as it cost me less than 50 quid and is on a black and white label. But it is a very good tune and not a bad way to start the week.

The Thrills - I Feel A Thrill Coming On

Saturday 10 June 2017

WTF?



I still can't get my head round the election result. If you look at the plain facts, the Tories won and Labour lost. There are loads of people going on about percentages, if we had proportional representation, blah, blah, blah,  anything to justify their own partisan stance. I have decided it is what it is and now we need to get fucking things done and resolve all the outstanding issues rather than rehashing the last seven weeks.

Being a but more parochial, the SNP are still the largest party in Scotland but Ruth the Mooth's mob got 13 seats. I never thought I would ever see the day when the Tories got over double figures in Scotland. Either there is some sort of collective amnesia about what happened to this country in the 80s and early 90s or the Union Jack means a lot more to a lot of people than their children/grandchildren's futures or the kind of society they live in.

There are so many questions that are unanswered and things unresolved by this result but one glaring issue  at the moment relevant up here is concerning me more than any other.

 After the SNPs historic result in 2015, there were an awful lot of voices clamoring for English Votes For English Laws that most of us in Scotchlandshire to be honest said,  fair enough, nothing to do with us really, we have our Parliament for those things and it's only fair that the things that only matter to England should be up to their elected representatives to debate and vote on. Last night I began to wonder if EVEL was still a thing and if so that means that Mrs May cannot rely on the 13, I will say it again so it sinks in, FUCKING THIRTEEN! Tory MPs in the place where the English party have nothing but contempt for. Or as I suspect all of those champions of fairness and democracy such as John Redwood and living anachronism, Jacob Rees Mogg will be strangely silent now.

Marvin Gaye - What's Going On (Reflex re-fit)

Thursday 8 June 2017

Blue. It's A Colour So Cruel




I think that after today we may find ourselves in a re-run of the 80s politically. All we would then need would be for Duran Duran and Spandau Ballet to re-form for everything to be completely fucked.

You know what you need to do.

Fine Young Cannibals - Blue

Wednesday 7 June 2017

Bamboo



If the word low-fi didn't already exist it would have to have been invented to describe the music made by the four lassies from Madrid who go by the name of Hinds, these days after being forced to change their name from Deers by a band with the same name who threatened legal action. Bamboo was first released through Bandcamp in 2014 when the group were still called Deers and only a duo. It was later released on a ltd pressing white 10" single, The Very Best of Hinds So Far which contained all of their singles up until that point and another live track. The ep is well worth searching for as all of the tracks are nearly as good as Bamboo, or you could just buy the excellent album Leave Me Alone or better still get both.

Enjoy

Hinds - Bamboo

Tuesday 6 June 2017

Gone



C mentioned today's track over at the WYCRA collective's bit a couple of Saturday's ago in the comments for The Saturday Song Challenge and I have to thank her because I had forgotten all about this brilliant slice of British Mod/Psych from 1968. It was the b-side of Path Through The Forest,  the first of group's two singles. I think Mr Weller may have been listening to this track prior to writing That's Entertainment as the intro bears an uncanny resemblance to it, well to me anyway. I once read somewhere that this was a cover of a Paul Revere and The Raiders song which is a load of bollocks as the track Gone by them is a cover itself of a country song from the Fifties*.

The Factory - Gone

* C in the comments has posted a link to the Paul Revere song Gone Movin' On and it would appear that the Factory did indeed cover Paul Revere and The Raiders and therefore not for the first time it is me talking bollocks. Thanks C

Monday 5 June 2017

All The Way



Ruby Andrews is responsible for recording one of the greatest ever mid tempo soul songs ever in Just Loving You which has the dubious pleasure of being number three in my all time 50 Northern Soul singles. All The Way was released on the same Zodiac label a couple of years later in 1970 and was actually the flip of Help Yourself (Lover). although it is not Just Loving You,  it is another piece of classy mid tempo soul well worth beinb better known than it is.

Ruby Andrews - All The Way 

Friday 2 June 2017

It's Friday . . . Let's Dance



Back to the heyday of Progressive House today with one of the main architects of the sound, William Orbit. In fact if you look up Progressive House in Wiki, it states that Orbit's Guerilla label "is thought to have been pivotal in the growth of the scene around the genre" I know that the online tool can be as inaccurate as hell sometimes but that statement is kind of spot on.

Water from a Vine Leaf was released in 1994 not on the Guerilla label but Virgin with mixes from Guerilla label mates Spooky and one of the emerging big guns of dance, Underworld. The vocals are supplied by frequent Orbit collaborator Beth Orton. I have opted for Spooky's Xylem Flow mix which for me is the version for the dancefloor with the driving acid line. The track would go on to further prominence after it's inclusion in the Sasha and Digweed compilation Northern Exposure three years after the record's release.

The football season has only been over for a fortnight and already I have had to deal with IKEA and shed cleaning so I suppose that this weekend will follow a similar plan, although I have yet to be informed of what that plan me be. Suffice to say that it will not involve sitting on my arse doing nothing.

Have a good weekend people.

William Orbit - Water From A Vine Leaf (Xylem Flow mix)

Thursday 1 June 2017

Future Starts Slow



I have had this song from the Kills fourth album on repeat for the last week or so. There is right malevolent, foreboding vibe about the track, not the usual sexual tension present in a lot of the duo's output. Like my other favourite from this album , Baby Says,  there is a distorted sound to the track which sometimes irritates me and at others feels just right and at present it sounds great. Also it may be my ears but the drumming sounds "real" not like a drum machine to me although nobody is credited on the sleeve notes. At the moment Blood Pressures is vying for my favourite Kills album with their debut Keep On Your Mean Side.

The Kills - Future Starts Slow