The fourth Recluse night coming up...

...at the Flea Pit, Columbia Road, east London on Thursday 31st January. Info here.

I've moved from Bethnal Green

There's a wonderful excerpt here on Pitchfork's site from a new book about the No Wave scene that coalesced in downtown New York in the late 70's. Reading the quotes from various movers and shakers in the scene from that extract, including the obvious suspects - Lydia Lunch, James Chance, various members of Mars (pictured above) etc. - the biggest impressions are how cheap it was to get buy (I couldn't help but smile at this quote from Glenn Branca: "I had a 1200 square-foot loft for $180 a month"), how readily available space was, and the inherent possibilities opened up as a consequence. I suppose comparisons could be made with Notting Hill and Portobello Road earlier on and at the same time as No Wave, with it's countercultural ripples and a squat scene that took in Hawkwind and (later on) The Raincoats. It makes somewhat depressing reading given the contrast with both cities now; it's hard enough to maintain a steady living in London even with a job, if it's not one that pays especially well (as a glance at this testifies). Lower East Side now, where the No Wave musicians congregated, closely resembles in some ways Shoreditch, but I would imagine LES - and certainly not the latter, with it's steadfastly increasing prices - can hardly be considered bohemian anymore, if the definition of bohemian is an area where an artistic community can make a living on a modest budget. A flat viewing in nearby Whitechapel a while ago told me all I need to know: greedy landlords are ripping us off in London. The rent was easily in the £400+ per month bracket - for a flat at the top of a block, with no lift.
So I've moved to another part of London now. Along the way, as I've navigated my way around the city I've noticed that most new residential properties that have sprouted in London look exactly the same. It only confirms just how much landlords in this city couldn't care less about aesthetics: why worry about beauty when demand outstrips supply and you can pack in as many people into as small a space as possible? After my previous post about the closure of the Spitz, we can now look forward to the prospect of Turnmills closing down, as the arts scene in London becomes more and more a casualty.
What strikes me about reading that extract is what a unique period the musicians were in: no doubt NYC must have been a nightmarish place to live in sometimes then, but around the areas that the scene converged, it nonetheless offered endless possibilities; an energy that produced genres and ideas that hadn't become compartmentalised and spun off by endless lifestyle magazines, where there was real possibilities to explore different strands of arts while not being shackled by lucrative rents. If there's any equivalent these days, it's probably elsewhere: Berlin, for one, or Montréal.

Hello there everybody, and sorry for the long delay in replying - a busy December and all that, including the All Tomorrow's Parties shindig hosted by Portishead. Most ATP's that I've been to have had their fair share of madness - has anyone actually had a completely sober ATP? - but Sun O)))'s ludicrously OTT set on a seriously gruelling Sunday - Boris, Earth, and Sun O))) on the main stage, various metal-looking bands on the Reds stage, Black Mountain on the Pavillion stage - pipped the competition. With a 'singer' that looked like the an extra from the Tree People in the Lord of the Rings, more dry ice than a Sisters of Mercy gig, and a general air of ludicrousness, Spinal Tap-style, mixed in with genuine excitement from the audience, they arrived twenty minutes or so late, having assaulted (I'm assuming it wasn't real) the audience with automated fire emergency building evacuation tannoys. The following two hours (a very long two hours) eschewed all the traditional signifiers of metal - pounding drums, ludicrous lyrics about "the beast" (or some such), flashy guitar solos accompanied by headbanging - leaving a sheer magma-like trail of earsplitting guitar noise and sub-bass keyboard 'notes' combined with sheer theatrics and a sublimely pantomine-like procession of Dark Ages-looking characters onstage dressed in robes. I certainly got my money's worth, if anything else, and there was also an inter-band punch-up at the end for good measure.
Meanwhile, am I the only one who thinks that the new material during Portishead's set sounded like Broadcast meets electroclash? Perhaps they've been hanging around The Macbeth / Jaguar Shoes / the Mother bar or whatever place in Shoreditch plays electroclash these days.
Other great memories of the festival: a wizened Jah Shaka of Jah Shaka Sound System (which consisted of Jah Shaka and, well, his soundsystem) babbling repeatedly at his Echo Deck (or whatever it was) about "Bablyon" and "Jah", at which point I took the picture above; the singer of wonderful folk-rock act Lucky Luke quipping about hangovers in the middle of their set while facing an audience entirely lying down (this being 12 noon on a Sunday); Onedia and their excitable drummer; Glenn Branca (picture above) conducting his guitar orchestra that included Thurston Moore, Adrian Utley, one of Fuck Buttons, and many others; Polar Bear bringing Sun Ra vibes to the Reds stage; Julian Cope's surreal end-of-set rant about "the X in Exmoor" and religion in general; the bar staff beyond despair during the 'metal day' (as Sunday was christened); the Aphex Twin mixing in the Grandstand theme tune with his set, and finishing with an undanceable gabba noise finale, topped off with the sound of someone saying "Motherfucker" a lot, as well as a sample of a track by Whitehouse (possibly "A Cunt Like You" with William Bennett yelling "look at yourself - have some fucking decorum!", though I could be wrong); ludicrous freak-out double-drummer improv rock by Damo Suzuki with Fuzz Against Junk; A Hack And A Hacksaw playing in the middle of the audience; and Simeon of 60's primitive electronics outfit Silver Apples - a man whose probably took more acid than the entire line-up of Jefferson Airplane a few times over - resembling your Dad doing karaoke onstage; Om taking ages to kick in the distortion, at which point the bar staff look terrified; Chrome Hoof in their silver-plated glam-rock stomp pomp...I could go on.
Disappointments: not being able to find the ATP cinema (where the fuck is it?). The toilets in the Pavillion Stage. Françoiz Breut not turning up and the staff not telling us until we've waited for 45 minutes, facing an empty stage. The empty nightclubs due to late sets by bands...anyway, I'm off to Flickr.

Stockhausen and Turner RIP

Just come back from ATP to find this double-whammy...



Karlheinz Stockhausen 1928-2007
I'm not going to pretend to be an authority on his work, but even I know that he was a legend. Stockhausen was one of the pioneers of electronic music and 20th century composition. Hugely influential in his use of primitive electronics and tape machines, his influence extends to Krautrock, techno, experimental rock, and modern composition. Maybe there would even have been no Can without Stockhausen? Suppose it's one of those "what if..." questions, but still...really wish I went to that gig he did in a fish market in East London a while ago now. Bet it was awesome.
And...
Ike Turner 1931-2007
For this tune (clip below) with Madame Turner on vocals long before she was mates with Mick Jagger (the 80s did strange things to the careers of music legends). Goodnight London still has it on Tamla Motown 7", like the sad record collector nerd that I am. He looks the business in this clip. And this song still sound enormous on record (Phil Spector, I believe?).

Not long now...

...until ATP curated by Portishead. Things I am looking forward to:
- Silver Apples on at around 1:30am
- ditto for Jah Shaka Sound System, who sound terrifying and seriously bass-heavy
- ditto for Aphex Twin, hopefully sans sandpaper machine
- the Sunday triumphate of Earth, Boris and Sun O))), on one after the other, which could well send the bouncers into tears
- Fuck Buttons, whenever they are on. And A Hawk And A Hacksaw
- Glenn Branca playing twice (though one of his sets is fifteen minutes?!)
- whatever films Portishead choose to host on the ATP Portishead TV channel
- the sheer surreality of seeing GZA from the Wu-Tang Clan playing at Butlin's in Somerset
Things I'm possibly not looking forward to:
- getting soaked while walking to the venue from the chalet
- feeling hungover and soaked while watching said bands
- rubbish food in the venue
- queing to watch bands in the Centre Stage

Lady Jaye RIP

Some great events going on as part of the celebrations to herald twenty five years of The Wire's existence. Various happenings included a celebration of Finnish psych folk and drone at Bush Hall that was punctuated by a blistering set from guitar and drums duo Pymathon. Then there was also an all-dayer at Cargo beginning at 5pm which saw Jackie O-Motherfucker headline at something like 11:30pm on a Sunday night, reduced to a trio because of illness, and ended with an argument with a member of the audience. It was that kind of day. Still, Jackie-O weren't bad for what it's worth, and earlier on the venue saw the spectre of some wonderfully strange acts - Birds of Delay, Polly Shang Kuan Band (above), The Sound Of The Exquisite Corpse, Axolotl - all of which produced some seriously out-there drone and improvised music. Then again, I could have done without Talibam!, a 'zany' duo with a terrible name and even worse music, and the even more comedic Putting On The Ritz playing in the bar area. Shame the gig at Shoreditch Town Hall - a venue with some amazing endless passageways and catacombs in it's basement, as Goodnight London discovered recently - with the Boredoms and Michael Gira was sold out.
The screening of the documentary about Genesis P-Orridge and his partner Lady Jaye at the Roxy Bar & Screen was of particular interest, though, given Throbbing Gristle's recent resurrection - a band hugely influential in their own right. The scenes of Mr P-Orridge (Neil Megson by birth) with his partner are strangely touching, especially given the recent sad news of Lady Jaye's passing due to stomach cancer. Always one to espouse the visual, interactive, and participatory side of art, P-Orridge's discussions on camera about the 'project'-like nature of his part sex-change - which involved breast implants in order to somehow 'fuse' or 'become one' with his partner to create a 'pandrogynous' synthesis entitled Genesis Breyer P-Orridge - are among the most interesting in the documentary, particularly when much of the doc follows him on tour with Psychic TV or Thee Majesty or whoever it is he's playing with. Whether Ms Jaye participated in reciprocal body modification to appear more, well, manly, is unclear.
I have to admit I tittered a bit at the scene in which P-Orridge elaborated on how the human race must embrace pandrogyny in order to advance to the next stage of human evolution. Daring transgressive artists living in New York and attending galleries such as P-Orridge is one thing, but whether Dave from Telford is willing to ascribe to this next step is another. I suppose it depends on whether you subscribe to the belief that humans have reached the limit of our evolution, or whether evolution is a constant, modifying force in our life which we simply don't notice. In any case, pandrogyny is essentially artificial, i.e. created synthetically by doctors in the surgery clinic.

Third Recluse night this Thursday (29th November 2007)

...and it's free! And it's in a wicked venue!! And there's more posts to come on this blog soon!!!

RIP Stylus magazine

A great website bites the dust...
and some new music writing by me here - an e-mail interview with Six Organs of Admittance on Pennyblackmusic.

Crikey.
James Lawton is going to have a field day in The Independent tomorrow.

The World is a Surreal Place indeed (part 2)

Anyone who went to the Shoreditch Festival in the summer, in which Mr Har Mar Superstar headlined - yes, him of the fat belly, moustache, redneck appearance, and inevitable desire to take his clothes off onstage while doing mediocre Prince impressions - may have saw an indie band further down the bill with an amusing name. No, I'm not referring to Selfish C*nt, but Bono Must Die, who were on the X-Box (?!)Stage. Now, I'm not one to condone random violence against celebrities, but most 'cult' bands are supposed to have stupid names. Personally, I think the existence of such outfits as Half Man Half Biscuit, Pissed Jeans and Fuck Buttons are necessary and important additions to modern humanity's existence, and give meaning to life.
Anyway, the real Bono, in unbelievably self-important fashion, has threatened the band with his lawyers. There's something inherently hilarious about the singer of one of the biggest bands of the world - if you don't count that American Express-sponsored, increasingly embarrassing outfit known as the Rolling Stones - threatening a law suit against a suitably trashy-looking minor Shoreditch band (well, they're Shoreditch in spirit anyway) that probably barely plays outside the area. Exactly how many records have BMD sold? Of course, it no doubt came about because of Bob Geldof - who else? - being less than impressed at his daughter's fondness for said outfit. And Geldof and Bono are mates, right? I can just see them in the pub, and the look on Bono's face when Geldof relays the news. Does Bono not have better things to do with him time? Like, discover irony or have a photo opportunity with the Pope, or something?

hello everyone...been busy moving house and checking out the delights of Berlin. But watch this space for some posts this week!

Now this is something I wish I'd seen....

As urban guerrilla sounding in it's own way as Throbbing Gristle, drum 'n' bass or techno, Glenn Branca has always produced some awe-inspiring music. My particular favourites are 'Lesson No.1 for Electric Guitar' and 'The Ascension', in which you can hear the endless oscillating strands of sound that come from multiple guitars. Presumably an orchestra of one hundred guitars at once would produce endless micro-tonal possibilities? I actually think that the two tracks by him mentioned above sort of predate genres like shoegazing and post-rock that we've become used to. There's not a huge difference between the tracks and some of Godspeed You! Black Emperor's work, for example. Or Seefel's 'Quiqe'. Anyway, this gig is something I wish I'd went to, along with the Boredoms gig in New York, in a park with 77 drummers on the 7th July 2007, at 7pm, which would perfectly fit their frenzied drum incantations:

Sadly, though, I couldn't go to Branca, due to relocating this weekend to a new house near Walthamstow Dog Tracks of all places, where my famous neighbours will include Blazin' Squad, Daniella Westbrook (her of the nose sans septum), Teddy Sheringham, and - of course - Brian Harvey. Exactly how I've gone from Glenn Branca to Brian Harvey in one post I don't know. Still, Branca's playing two sets at the Portishead ATP in December (including one set with 'special guests' - no doubt Thurston Moore will be among them, as he's doing a solo set too), so will catch him then.

Following on from my post about the Spitz...

...we will also shortly see the end of King's Cross' dark, shadowy industrial wasteland as it makes way for luxury flats (which will doubtless be those new model flats that all seem to look exactly the bloody same in that bland way), and the extension to the Eurostar - and with it, the Canvas complex of nightclubs (though I believe The Egg club will stay). K-Punk's post here is a fitting eulogy / requiem to an area that I still have imprinted in my mind from when I used to go to raves there in the mid-90s in the open brick courtyard / warehouse area, at what was then called Bagley's (which really makes me feel my age). I revisited that area recently with the TDK Festival, and a wave of nostalgia came over me; I always used to wonder what went on in those endless rows of warehouses, if there were interesting bands or events happening there. Now, much of this landscape will all be gone soon, obliterated in the desire for more luxury flats and wine bars/bistros; it's inescapable. It will become just another trendy area of London.

Going to see Control this week...

The Spitz RIP

So, despite the endless petition signatures, the leafleting, the articles in newspapers, and even the pleas by dear old Red Ken Livingstone, it wasn't enough for the Spitz to close, the latest victim of the area's corporatisation (though the venue has done stuff since at Rich Mix). I guess the sight of people making weird left-field experimental music at an interesting venue in a perfect location was just to much to bare for Ballymore Properties, who would prefer the an anodyne wine bar full of city yuppies. Although CBGB's had reportedly become a parody of its former self near the time it was shut down, you could almost draw parallels: the two areas around the Spitz and CBGB's are accelerating in the property market, and live music is always going to be the casualty (particularly once the new East London line is built). This is no place for nostalgia about what both venues have gave their respective cities in terms of culture or an arts scene. Obviously the Spitz was only one venue in London. But it was pretty much the best venue. Anyway, nostalgia doesn't count for anything when you have a prime location near the financial district. Who wants to listen to that unlistenable music when you can have an All Bar One? It's not like that area is lacking in investment bankers / lawyers etc to frequent the posh bars spouting up, of which the Spitz's replacement on that site will be one.
Another nail in the coffin for an independent scene in London, then (along with the Hammersmith Palais - another great venue). Still, there's always Starbucks across the road...
Anyway on a more serious note, the spirit of the Spitz lives on in part just down the road, at a great venue called the Gramaphone. And there's the Duke of Uke and the new Rough Trade East, to remind me why I still go to the area.

My third ATP in December...

...this time curated by Portishead, and Silver Apples have just been added to the bill! Along with four doom metal bands, Jah Shaka Soundsystem, Glenn Branca (playing twice!), the Aphex Twin, Julian Cope, and countless others, some of whom I've heard of (Oneida) and some I haven't (Crippled Black Phoenix? The Heads? Jo Volk?). Why aren't Movietone on the bill? Anyway, it confirms my theory that Portishead have always had more in common aesthetically with left-field guitar music than most electronica (and especially aberrations of the 'trip-hop' genre such as Zero 7 and Groove Armada - music for media people living in 'pads' in Notting Hill). They also take a nice swipe at another aberration of music, Mark Ronson, here. Exactly who is choosing to pay to go to Shepherd's Bush Empire and see this man do karaoke versions of the Kaiser Chiefs, among other acts, is mystifying; clearly someone is, as his gig there is sold out. Ronson is the prime example of music as background music; it can be played anywhere and, because it's not even his own compositions but rather pointless covers, it's easy to digest anywhere. You can play it on your iPod anywhere and not have to really think about the music. He's a prime example of music's superficiality in the digital age, when the sheer abundance of music negates it's importance: it's everywhere, from the clothes shop to the hairdresser. "Oh, but they're inventively done covers that add a twist to the original". So what, though? I guess I don't hang at the right parties at the Notting Hill Arts Club, so I wouldn't understand. This is Ronson's demographic. His music is seen as "cool" and "fresh" takes on old songs, which Kate Nash/Lilly Allen/Amy Winehouse types put on at parties.

At this point, I should just point I have an iPod myself and actually like it. But I also take the music on it seriously rather than treating it as background music. Which is one reason for the importance of All Tomorrow's Parties. Roll on December.

Wyatting

After revealing the practice of 'Wyatting' in this post a few months ago, I am proud to say that I 'Wyatted' a pub in Aldgate recently for the first time, who just happened to have an 'infinite' internet jukebox - the first one that I've seen. Needless to say, they had an incredible library of music connected to the Internet, so a brace of 'Stabbed In The Face' by Wolf Eyes was in order, followed by the charming ditties of Anal C**t. Given that one track costed a pound, I decided not to broadcast to the pub the entire works of Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Acid Mothers Temple or Swans 'Public Castration Is A Good Idea'. Maybe if I had, the police might have moved in. Sadly the staff decided to turn down the volume of Wolf Eyes' masterpiece of power electronics so that it was barely discernable, and most people didn't seem to notice anyway because of the rugby, but for one moment I revelled in childish glory...anyone know of other pubs in London that have those internet jukeboxes?

Recluse night at Flea Pit

After the first Recluse night, there now comes the second...Saturday 23rd September 2007 at the Flea Pit, Columbia Road, doors 7:30. Isnaj Dui, Alex Monk and Rowan Porteous live.

Daydream at the Roundhouse

So Sonic Youth performing Daydream Nation at the Roundhouse did have the twinge of nostalgia workout about it (see previous blog entry here). The whole experience of watching bands perform albums in their entirety (as part of the Don't Look Back festival) is still a weird experience - you know exactly what's coming next and in which order the songs are going to be. Viewed cynically, it's simply a band reciting their greatest work without expanding on it.
Yet the gig was still a fantastic experience that brought back so many memories. There's something about it's distinctive tidal wash of oceanic noise and open-ended guitar symphony, with melodies spilling off in all directions, that keeps me returning to it - particularly as it soundtracked years of my adolescent life. Like Joy Division's Unknown Pleasures (which I cover in this post), there was something mysterious and intense about the front cover when I first saw it, an image that's about as far removed from punk rock as you can get. At the gig, there was something apt about watching the godfathers of dissonance and noise performing an album that offered a whole new chapter in rock dynamics, and a whole new language with its innovative tunings, at the Roundhouse, where Zeppelin and Hendrix expanded the possibilities of what could be utilized with a rock set-up in the 60's.
Ahh, bliss...those opening chords...

Razorshite

yeh Gods, just watched some highlights of Reading/Leeds - with Razorfuckinglight in the headline slot, a band that makes even the Kaiser Chiefs sound positively innovative. For fuck's sake. Thankfully, a few other people feel the same.