Oblique Saturdays

A series for Saturdays in 2026 inspired by Brian Eno and Peter Schmidt's set of cards, Oblique Strategies (Over One Hundred Worthwhile Dilemmas). Eno and Schmidt created them to be used to unblock creative impasses and approach problems from unexpected angles. Each week I'll turn over an Oblique Strategy card and post a song or songs inspired by the suggestion. 

Last week's Oblique Strategy was this- Towards the insignificant- and my song choices went all existential, Pixies, Julian Cope and Tim Burgess. Suggestions from readers (Ernie, Khayem, JC, Walter and Chris) took in Talking Heads' Road To Nowhere, Nic Roeg's film Insignificance and its soundtrack song by Glenn Gregory and Claudia Brucken, The Indelicates and The Last Significant Statement To Be Made In Rock 'n' Roll, John Martyn's Solid Air, Richard Norris' Music For Healing series, anything by Nick Drake, and Frazier Chorus' Nothing (Land Of Oz Mix). That's as good a playlist about insignificance as we're ever going to assemble. 

Today's card is this- Put in earplugs. 

Which made me laugh out loud when I turned it over. 

Friends of mine attended the recent My Bloody Valentine gig at Factory Aviva Studios in Manchester (I missed out on tickets). They all wore earplugs, all found it deafeningly, unbelievably loud and couldn't tell, despite being confirmed and long time MBV fans, which songs were actually being played. Their account made me regret even more that I missed it in a way. 

You Made Me Realise

The loudest gig I've attended in recent years was Bob Mould at Manchester Academy 2 in March 2019, a gig that in retrospect I should have worn earplugs for. The hearing in my right ear has not been the same since. I wrote about it at the time...

Bob Mould at Manchester Academy 2 on Sunday night, twenty years after I last saw him play there. Back in 1998 he played almost entirely solo stuff, promoting his then new record The Last Dog And Pony Show, with just a Sugar song held back for the encore. This time around, promoting his current new album Sunshine Rock, he plays songs from the last forty years of playing and making records, from their earliest recordings to his latest. Backed by a high kicking bassist and a drummer engaged in a one man war of attrition with his snare drum Bob hits the stage loud and fast and doesn't really let up. His guitar/pedals/twin amp set up makes Bob sound like two or three guitarists and it's loud, really loud, with those crystalline melodies fired off within the sheets of distorted riffs. 

There are few gaps between the songs, no light show to speak of, no projections or backdrop- just songs from the Bob Mould back catalogue. He opens with 2014 song The War and then blasts straight into Sugar's A Good Idea, the bass riff on its own for a few seconds before being submerged in Bob's wall of guitars. Three songs in and we're into I Apologise off Husker Du's 1985 New Day Rising. There is then a liberal smattering of songs from Sunshine Rock, Bob's self-willed optimistic, happy album, an album written in the aftermath of the death of both parents and Husker drummer Grant Hart, songs like Thirty Dozen Roses and Sin King, and highlights from Sugar's 1992 album Copper Blue (Hoover Dam sounds enormous, bigger than the guitars and keyboards of the album version). People around me are adjusting their earplugs. 

Husker Du's 1982 hardcore single In A Free Land has been dusted down and in Trump's wake sounds no less relevant and no less alive. Bob has been unwell in recent days and on antibiotics for a chest infection, not that you'd guess- Sugar's If I Can't Change Your Mind roaring out of the amps, noise plus melodies, punk plus choruses. He pauses three quarters of the way through to thank us for coming and introduce Jason Narducy and Jon Wurster on bass and drums and then its back to business. Something I Learned Today, one of Husker Du's most vital songs, is a ferocious blast, spitting fire and piss and from this point, for the final fifteen minutes or so Bob and band go off setlist, launching into one Husker Du song after another, almost a medley- Chartered Trips, their cover of The Mary Tyler Moore theme Love Is All Around Us, a beautiful and raging Celebrated Summer with Bob stretching out the pause into the guitar picking section at the end, finishing with Makes No Sense At All, the single that paved the way for Pixies and Nirvana to name but two. No encore. Lights on. Ears ringing. Home.

Hoover Dam

Chartered Trips

Neither of those mp3s give any idea of how loud Bob was that night. At one point people were physically flinching and stepping back from the stage. I remember moving forwards into a gap and turning my head sideways on at one point as Bob turned the single guitar he was playing into three, all at max volume. 

Bob recently announced Sugar's reformation and a new single, Long Live Love. And gigs including one in Manchester at the end of May. Put in earplugs. 

Thrice Yes

'Language has the power to alter our perceptions... a single word can change our reality... and that word is yes!'

Jezebell's second album, Jezebellearic Beats Volume 2, came out last year, a twenty track, four sides of vinyl epic with remixes, edits, originals and five brand new recordings. The album's ultimate track was Turn It Yes, the song that maybe Jesse and Darren have been building up to all this time- rippling synths, rolling electronic drums and percussion, a vocal sample about language and reality and the word yes and a second vocal sample, one about a famous exhibition at The Indica Gallery in 1966 that proved to be a crucial part of the story of one of the most famous people of the 20th century. 

Today sees the release of a remix EP, Turn It Yes redone in three versions. Sean Johnston's Hardway Bros remix is straight out of Sean's top drawer, a thumping, pumping, uptempo glide by that threatens to turn into Underworld on several occasions- I can imagine Two Months Off and this remix being mixed in and out of each other, cutting from one to the other for ages. Sean keeps it going, the juddering kick drum and the words and the topline, all piling up, a never ending peak. The Parvale Remix is tougher still, a four four chug with everything- bpms, synths, rave bass- set to max. 

Justin Robertson is the third man, remixing Jezebell in his psychic folk dub, Five Green Moons mode, slowing Jezebell down, dubbing the bass, FX ricocheting, drums skanking, organ notes flaring like flashes of sunshine and that nagging key topline appearing and re- appearing and the vocals slurred and stoned... 'and that word is Yes'. Justin's on a roll right now and this one is right up there with his best work of recent times. 

You can find Turn It Yes Remixes Vol. 1 at Bandcamp. 

Justin can also be found remixing Brisbane band Das Druid. The Aussie three piece have been compared to the sound of late 80s/ early 90s Manchester, the swaggering indie- dance rolling drums, psychedelic guitar lines and euphoric, wide eyed spirit. On their Das EP there are three songs- Freedom, Less Than 3 and Incense- and if you slotted them into a Madchester/ indie dance playlist they'd be right at home, you'd barely hear the joins. The third of those three, Incense, also carries one of the next steps from those early 90s days, the spaced out swirl and psychedelic rock of Spiritualized and early Verve. 

Justin's Five Green Moons remix of Freedom comes in two versions, a remix and a dub, each eight minutes long, the spaced out dubness, FX and melodica and slo mo rhythms slipping and sliding through a Five Green Moons haze. As well as those two Das Druid are put through their paces by Ruf Dug, the Stoner Trance Version of Incense, a slow burning behemoth, distorted bass and grinding rhythm in contrast to the half whispered, starsailing vocal. The drums double up at three minutes and there's some wailing, an acid house, psychedelic stew. Intense. Incense. 'Two hands are better than one'.

The Das EP is also available at Bandcamp. 

Justin is in demand in the world of Magick Knives too where he's taken the Dungeon Jazz and Wizard Psych of their song Existence into his folk- dub netherworld, where the hills have eyes and the isles are being prepared for midsummer. Dislocated trumpets, disembodied vocals, spindly guitars and whirling organs. Get tripped out at Bandcamp. 

Armed And Eleven

Last weekend was The Golden Lion's 11th birthday, a weekend of musical events to celebrate the 11 years since Gig and Waka took the Todmorden pub and turned it into something much more than a pub- 'ceci n'est pas une pub' is painted onto the side of the building. On Friday night Joe Goddard from Hot Chip played and on Saturday there was a Belfast themed takeover with David Holmes headlining downstairs and the band Deeply Armed playing upstairs. Around these two we got to play again, the Flightpath Estate DJs from 2pm downstairs and then either side of the band upstairs.

We played a bagful of tunes and maybe at some point we'll recreate at least part of the several hours long set and share it here. There was a section in the middle where I played Richard Norris' remix of Warpaint (Disco// Very), the Two Lone Swordsmen remix of X- Press 2's Witchi Tai To and then this...

Kingdom Of Rust (Prins Thomas Diskomiks)

... which had a few people reaching for the Shazam app on their phone. It's a wonderful Prins Thomas version, the drums and bass winding their way round and round and a guitar picking out single notes, building over several minutes, the guitars and strings gradually joining, the sound becoming richer and fuller but all the while following the groove. Those trademark, world weary Doves vocals arrive halfway through. A glorious eight minutes of music. 

Deeply Armed flew over from Belfast, a band with a one single behind them, some serious remix action (Keith Tenniswood, Richard Fearless) and an album recorded and ready to go. They took to the stage at 9.30 playing to a full room, singer Michael brandishing a tambourine and giving the Ian Brown stare into the middle distance of the room. Around him the band kick up a motorik groove, synths and guitar/ bass conjuring a blissed, psychedelic sound- repetition, garage band chord changes, Spacemen 3 tempo, and the street menace of early Happy Mondays evident too on some of the first half of the nine song set. On last year's single The Healing it all comes together into one krauty/ Velvets drone...

Downstairs fellow Belfast native David Holmes is kicking up a storm. We miss the first part of his set due to playing before and after the band but after the Deeply Armed have finished and everyone has moved downstairs- Holmes v The Flightpath Estate, it's no contest- I make my way down and into the maelstrom of a packed Golden Lion, dancers everywhere, the red lights bouncing off the mirrorball and a Holmes set that takes in Crooked Man, the Leftside Wobble edit of Tomorrow Never Knows, All Seeing I and much more. 

Blacked Out

Black Bones, a Belfast duo, released a six track album last year that took nightclub music- techno, dub, disco, whatever else gets people dancing- and lit a fire under it. Tough beats, wonky experimental sonics, a dark Balearic feel, more than a little influenced by various points in Andrew Weatherall's back catalogue- the noir feel of Sabres, the basement beats of 2000 era Two Lone Swordsmen, the adventurism of his solo work from the 2010s. 

Black Bones have followed that album with a new 10" single, two more slices from Belfast. The A- side, Barrios And Barricades is an urban trip with voices, a banging bassline, a rattling snare, shrieks and cries, the thump in the chest you get when music is played through a big soundsystem and the staccato flash of the strobe. Full blooded music that makes you feel alive and in the moment. Listen and buy at Bandcamp. 

On the flip is Cruising, a Black Bones- Autumns collaboration. Cruising drives in with the same four four thud, the drum sound pushed to the edge and a bassline that would chew up the carpet at parties. Swirling around those two elements there are crashes and FX, echoed shouts, metal on metal and at two minutes forty seven seconds a breakdown, a brief pause before the tension and the rhythm returns. 

The Last Time I Saw You Was Down At The Greeks

A few weeks ago I came across the lyrics to The Broad Majestic Shannon, a Pogues song that is absolutely one of their finest songs and one of Shane's greatest lyrics. Looking at the words on my screen it occurred to me that they work perfectly as just the words, a poem. 

The last time I saw you was down at the Greeks
There was whiskey on Sunday and tears on our cheeks
You sang me a song that was pure as the breeze
On a road leading up Glenaveigh

I sat for a while at the cross at Finnoe
Where young lovers would meet when the flowers were in bloom
Heard the men coming home from the fair at Shinrone
Their hearts in Tipperary wherever they go

Take my hand and dry your tears, babe
Take my hand, forget your fears, babe
There's no pain, there's no more sorrow
They're all gone, gone in the years, babe

I sat for a while by the gap in the wall
Found a rusty tin can and an old hurley ball
Heard the cards being dealt and the rosary called
And a fiddle playing "Sean Dun Na Ngall"

And the next time I see you we'll be down at the Greeks
There'll be whiskey on Sunday and tears on our cheeks
For it's stupid to laugh and it's useless to bawl
'Bout a rusty tin can and an old hurley ball

Take my hand and dry your tears, babe
Take my hand, forget your fears, babe
There's no pain, there's no more sorrow
They're all gone, gone in the years, babe

So I walked as the day was dawning
Where small birds sang and leaves were falling
Where we once watched the row boats landing
By the broad majestic Shannon

Every line Shane writes in The Broad Majestic Shannon, every image he paints, can be seen and felt. That's how it seems to me, written down. The Pogues matched Shane's words with a glorious, swooning, lilting tune and performance.

The Broad Majestic Shannon

It took a while to suss out the penultimate line. I couldn't understand why after all these scenes Shane depicts so vividly, flashes of life from his childhood and teens, the tears and optimism of the chorus, and the new day of the last chorus, why Shane was watching robots landing. It made no sense. Was this a War Of The Worlds thing? Why were robots crossing Ireland's longest river? Back in the early 90s, having mentioned this to a friend, I got a postcard from him while he was on holiday in Ireland. He wrote an update of his adventures and places he'd been. The P.S. at the very bottom of the postcard read just this- 'it's row boats, not robots'. 

Not long after I saw the lyrics in front of me on my screen and had these thoughts, news of the death of Pogues drummer Andrew Ranken aged 72 appeared on my screen too. RIP Andrew. 

Monday's Long Song

It sounds overblown not to mention a little pretentious to state that with the release of Selected Ambient Works 85- 92 in 1993 Richard D. James invented a new language for electronic and ambient music. Many of the elements he used- basslines from house and techno, spongy synth tones, clicky, repetitive rhythm tracks made from drum samples, a sound that felt ultra- modern and futuristic yet seemed anchored in something from the past- were already familiar but the way he put them together, the way as Aphex Twin he constructed and layered his tracks, was something else and new too. A problem with Selected Ambient Works is that it is almost too good, so full of beauty, ambient/ dance music with ambition and nuance, that what came after would never sound as good. Richard continued to make many, many great records, tracks that flipped what electronic music could be, but the magic he conjured up on the thirteen tracks that make up SAW is almost unique to that record. 

This is Tha, a nine minute odyssey that starts out with the sound  of a tap dripping and then transforms into ambient/ techno, outer/ inner space, excursion. 

Tha

Hiss, clicky drums, a warm bassline that dances about that I can almost see (I can definitely imagine it visually), the hint of voices, keyboard notes in a space above the rest of the track and a murky, middle of the night feel- an otherworldly, dream energy. 

Some of the music on it was made by a teenage Richard, using homemade equipment and recorded onto cassette. Jon Savage, a man who knows about many things but especially music, said that Selected Ambient Works 'defined a new techno primitive romanticism' and the primitive nature of the music is absolutely part of its beauty. 

Forty Five Minutes Of Colourbox

A few days ago I posted Colourbox's Tarantula and the wonderful Pandit Pam Pam v Darkinari cover version of it (out two days ago here). Eduardo sent me this video he made on Friday, filmed on the forty five minute flight between Sao Paulo and Rio. 

Today's forty five minute mix is some Colourbox tracks thrown together/ skillfully sequenced, a celebration of a band who threw soul, reggae and dub, electro, industrial and sampling together into a big stew and came up with some genuinely pioneering records between 1982 and 1987.

Some biographical details first.  Colourbox were formed in London in 1982, brothers Martyn and Steve Young, Ian Robbins and singer Debion Currie. Currie and Robbins left a year later, after the first single was released (Breakdown/ Tarantula) and singer Lorita Grahame joined. They signed to 4AD, a street counterpoint to the ethereal, indie/ gothic sounds of the rest of the 4AD line up (Cocteau Twins, Dead Can Dance, This Mortal Coil) and released three albums, all called Colourbox, and a slew of great singles. In 1987 Colourbox and AR Kane collaborated as M/A/R/R/S and between them, despite a rather difficult studio relationship, created an international hit- Pump Up The Volume. Pop star fame and long running legal bother over Pump Up The Volume and sample clearance led both Martyn and Steve Young to abandon Colourbox. 4AD issued best ofs and  box sets and in 2000 Andrew Weatherall included them on his 9 'O' Clock Drop compilation. Steve Young died in 2016. 

Forty Five Minutes Of Colourbox

• Looks Like We're Shy One Horse
• Baby I Love You So (12" Mix)
• Breakdown
• Say You (12" Mix)
• Edit The Dragon
• Tarantula
• The Official Colourbox World Cup Theme
• Arena II

Looks Like We're Shy One Horse, packed with gun shots and Spaghetti Western samples, was the B-side to Colourbox's 1986 Baby I Love You So single. The slowed down dub section at the end is genuinely thrilling after six minutes of drum machines, guitars, keys, samples, river dredging bass and South London via the Great Plains.

The A- side was Baby I Love You So, a cover of a Jacob Miller and Augustus Pablo song from 1974. King Tubby Meets Rockers Uptown was constructed around the dub version of it. Colourbox's cover is a dub version it its own right, a masterful and superbly produced slice of 80s British street sounds with a bassline that you could chew. 

Breakdown was Colourbox's debut single, released in 1982 with Debian Currie on vocals. Tarantula is industrial synth with a detached, numbed vocal. Breakdown is New Wave synthpop, a very of its time song but one that should be better known than it is. 

Say You was a 1984 single, a cover of a U- Roy song from 1976, one of those reggae songs that has a complicated back story with umpteen versions, dubs and covers. Colourbox's version is sweet 80s electro dub- soul. 

In 1985 Colourbox released their first full length album- Colourbox (a mini- album called Colourbox came out two years before). It included Just Give 'Em Whiskey which I wanted to include here but couldn't find a digital version and a cover of Keep Me Hangin' On, the Motown classic. William Orbit plays guitar on Manic. The first 10, 000 copies with a second album, also called, wait for it Colourbox. The mini- album had versions and tracks extra to the first including Edit The Dragon, an electro/ sample piece that in some ways sounds like one of Pump Up The Volume's origin stories. Arena II is a different version of Arena, a mid- 80s soul/ torch song that could have been huge. 

Official Colourbox World Cup Theme was a 1986 single released on the same day as Baby I Love You So. The track was recorded to coincide with the 1986 Mexico World Cup and was nearly chosen by the BBC as the theme music for their coverage. It is Martyn Young's favourite Colourbox song and came in a sleeve that had Jimmy Hill on one side and Bobby Robson on the other. England went to the 1986 World Cup, managed by Bobby Robson and Jimmy Hill was the anchor in the studio- they reached the quarter finals where they lost to two pieces of Diego Maradona audacity.