Testcard

Think Inside The Box

This came in via an email and I'm glad I followed the link- nice uptempo, funky house from veteran German producer Boris Dlugosch and Joe Goddard with some very silky vocals exhorting people to abandon social media and step together. I especially like being advised to 'think inside the box'- let's have more jargon busting songs please.

For the first time ever, I have not exceeded my Boxnet bandwidth this month. Small achievements are still achievements. Either I've posted stuff people don't want or I've made far greater use of Soundcloud.

The Return Of Friday Night Is Rockabilly Night 110

I haven't got any tattoos- never seen one I really liked enough to make me want to get it done. I'm not saying I don't like them, I just never got the bug. Plus, when I were a lad, they were very much an outsider thing. You wouldn't have one done in a visible place if you ever wanted gainful employment. Hence, they were very much an outsider thing. I was never that much an outsider. Now, everyone has one, all over the place. Overexposed and from top to bottom. I was once in a busy swimming pool with my kids and I think we were the only  three people in the water without tattoos. A much younger colleague has her niece and nephew's names on her the tops of her feet. On a school trip she asked if I ever thought about having my kids names tattooed on me, to which I replied 'Nope. I can remember my kid's names.' Also, having them scrawled on my inner forearms won't make them mean any more to me. But occasionally a proper 50s style rockabilly tattoo can be appealing.

Tonight's Friday night song is a real swinging, bluesy rockabilly song from Jimmy Dempsey in 1960. He woke up this morning and she done moved- gone, left, skidaddled, real gone.

Think I might go for a pint.

She Done Moved

The Mekons

George, a regular commenter and Friday night rockabilly enthusiast has been having a clear out and found a book he thought I might be interested in- I was- so he sent it to me. Isn't the internet great? These connections we make sat in our homes with like minded souls around the globe (Glasgow Wolverhampton in George's case). The book is a collection of paintings and thoughts of Jon Langford, founder and foremost man of The Mekons. Jon Langford came from Wales and went to study art at Leeds University just as punk hit the provinces. Armed with some art criticism, some Marxist ideology, friendship with Gang Of Four and a complete inability to play their instruments The Mekons made the classic debut single Never Been In A Riot. A later version of The Mekons made country-punk, fired up by the real attitude of old country 'n' western, hard-living songs about love, loss, death, drinking and smoking. They toured the world in the 1980s leaving a trail of fiddles and guitars behind them and a small army of followers.

Where Were You is one of my favourite Mekons songs but I don't seem to have it on the hard drive any more. I do have this one...

Hello Cruel World

I've long liked this one, Memphis Egypt, about the redemptive power of rock 'n' roll...

The Strange Art

Today I have withdrawn my labour in protest against Michael Gove and his plans to further alienate the teaching profession. The Secretary of State for Education seems to have the view that teachers are the enemy and that the education system must be destroyed. Unfortunately striking will achieve precisely nothing- but when asked to strike I believe we should.

I don't know who FK Club are but this song/remix package is ace, in an Asphodells and A Love From Outer Space vein. The original mix is fairly full on, drums and an up-in-the-mix hi hat, an insistent piano riff, a bassline like a rubber band being repeatedly twanged just inches from your earhole, nicely repetitive. Of the remixes Richard Sen's is the one for me, adding bongos and a new, whopping great big bassline, although the others are no slouches. The In Flagrante one is a free download, the rest were released on vinyl a little while ago.

Never There When You Want Me

Andrew Weatherall and Timothy J Fairplay's Asphodells album has been remixed by various folk and is due for release this September. So far Record Shop Day saw a cracking 12" single with remixes by Wooden Shjips and Daniel Avery, a Justin Robertson  Deadstock 33s remix of Beglammered was aired on Weatherall's last 6 Mix radio show, Ivan Smagghe's doing One Minute's Silence and there's a Mugwump remix of A Love From Outer Space up on Youtube which I posted here on Lord Sabre's birthday (April 6th). This one by Sean Johnston's Hardway Bros has been up at Soundcloud for a while...



I'm hoping that the whole Ruled By Passion, Destroyed By Lust album will have been remixed by someone or other, and that the remixed lp will be sequenced in the order that they appear on the original. But maybe that's just me.

Jeepers Creepers

You might have thought that by 1988 Siouxsie and The Banshees were past their best but this No. 16 hit would suggest otherwise. There's still some good ole gothic melodrama and sexiness combined some genuine pop and a nod to late 80s hip hop as well. And an ascending and descending accordion riff that carries the whole thing along with Gallic flair. Peek-A-Boo began life as a B-side based around a John Cale sample but soon turned into a potential A-side and took a year to record, partly due to Siouxsie singing each line through a different mic.

Peek-A-Boo

The video is dead late 80s...

Dubhouse

This Hollie Cook and Prince Fatty cover version has got everything needed to make a great little dubby reggae song- snaking melodica, dub bass, some echo, sound effects and a lovely vocal. All the boxes ticked. I could listen to this all day.

You Know I'm No Good

Hang My Head

I've long had a soft spot for the recorded output of Pete Molinari, who I think I first discovered via his Billy Childish connections (Chatham, first album recorded in a day in Billy's kitchen). Then with a single off his second album, Sweet Louise, which I love to bits. So imagine my excitement when I read some time ago that Pete had recorded some songs with Andrew Weatherall- the song above is produced and mixed by him, and features guitar by Little Barrie from Little Barrie and Primal Scream. I've just listened to this for the first time (despite it being on Youtube since January- well publicised then) and think it bodes well for the soon to be released fourth lp Theosophy. He's contributed a song to the new Lone Ranger film too. Pete also spent part of an evening once a few years back chatting my sister up. Don't think he got anywhere.

Dub Fi Gwan

This King Tubby track is what dub should sound like (to my ears anyhow). Tubby mixing it live at the desk, The Aggrovators supplying the tick-ticka-tick-ticka-tick rhythm and excerpts of dub-a-dub-dub-dub bass with some spacey FX and phased guitar chords.  One of the first dub tracks I ever heard (via the Blood and Fire comp King Tubby: Evolution of Dub 1975-1979, essential). Out of this world.

Dub Fi Gwan

The Fatty Fatty Sound

Bagging Area loves the reggae and dub of Prince Fatty. He's currently in the States with Hollie Cook (whose album from two years ago was a joy, as was the offspring dub version lp). Prince Fatty has a ton of stuff up at Soundcloud, including a stream of the full ska/surf/spaghetti Western lp he did with The Mutant HiFi, The Return Of Gringo. It is as good as that sounds, chock full of skank, twang and samples...



There's also this, a mixtape by Dave Bongo, to celebrate the release of Fatty's Supersize album back in 2010, including the man himself, Danny Ray, Dennis Brown, Barrngton Levy and Cutty Ranks and others...



Or how about this one, highly recommended, a recent 45 minute live set- amongst it all you get Hollie Cook singing reggae versions of Kraftwerk's The Model and Amy Winehouse's You Know I'm No Good, a cover of Cypress Hill's Insane In the Brain and Eric B and Rakim chucked in the mix as well, free download...



There's loads more at Soundcloud. Get searching, get skanking.

Eh Oh

In a similarly deep and funky vein to yesterday's Four Walls/Craig Bratley track comes this remix of Femi Kuti and it is tip top. Big on the beats, with funky guitar, a massive and uplifting Afrobeat vocal and a horn led breakdown at just after five minutes that is worth the price of entry alone. Just been released on vinyl apparently. Hence you get a low quality mp3 rip to tempt you into parting company with cash.



Eh Oh (Liza Richardson Remix)

The Return Of Friday Night Is Rockabilly Night 109

I've posted this song before but it bears repeating- Sparkle Moore (born Barbara Morgan) was a pioneer of 50s rockabilly. She toured with Gene Vincent and dressed in men's leathers. Caused quite a stir I imagine. Sparkle only recorded seven songs, four released across a pair of 7" singles (in 1956 and '57) and three left unreleased. In 1957 she retired from the music industry to raise a family. And that's it. But what a tune.

'You should be labelled with a skull and cross bones
You're a jinx on my soul'

Skull And Cross Bones

Just Bob Our Heads To This Groove Right Here

This is a delightfully deep, dark Craig Bratley remix of Four Walls from back in 2011, featuring a man talking about going nightclubbing; not there for the smoke or the VIP section or the champagne, just the music. Craig Bratley has recently contributed a 10" single to Andrew Weatherall's Bird Scarer vinyl only series.

When Pigs Fly

This week's Joe Strummer/Clash obscurity is from the soundtrack of a 1993 film, When Pigs Fly, that ran out of cash. Joe wrote eight songs for the soundtrack of the film, directed by Sara Driver (partner of Joe's friend Jim Jarmusch). The soundtrack was never released, the film couldn't get a distributor, it was only shown at a few festivals, problems problems problems. The songs Joe wrote for it, in the depths of his wilderness years, are all rather good- as is a lot of Joe's soundtrack work- and have a laid back Latin vibe.

When Pigs Fly

Express Yourself

Drew's running a series of hip hop tracks from 1988, over at Across The Kitchen Table. By brilliant coincidence I heard both Express Yourself and Straight Outta Compton last night (at our local pub, not a hip hop hotspot it has to be said. And don't tut, it was a school night, I only had two pints). I was never particularly an NWA fan back in the day, but both songs sounded- clears throat- totally fresh and dope; Express Yourself especially with its lyrics about enslavement and censorship, and that Charles Wright and The Watts 103rd Street Rhythm Band sample. Incredibly, no swearing either.

Express Yourself

Bloods

From the B-side of Primal Scream's 2006 single Dolls (largely glammed up riff-nonsense) was this little gem, a remix of Bloods by Weatherall and Tenniswood. It was at this point that TLS were moving away from minimal techno towards a live garage/dub/rockabilly band sound and were doing the same with their remixes- see also the X-Press 2 Witchi Tai To and the Villalobos remixes from around the same time. Keith Tenniswood plays guitar and bass, Martin Duffy supplies melodica and organ and if I'm not mistaken the drum beat gets borrowed from or for the TLS Wrong Meeting album a year later.

Bloods (Two Lone Swordsmen Mix)

La Yegros

I read a review of La Yegros in the Sunday paper from the World Music section, probably not more than eighty words in length, and decided to have a look. I am now enjoying some fine Cumbia. Cumbia is a style I've read about and heard about before, once from Bez of all places, but never really investigated, apart from hearing bits and bobs on Strummer's World Service radio shows. It is the folk music of Columbia but with a side order of reggae in it- the music originated from a fusion of the local Indians' culture with that of imported Caribbean slaves creating 'raw rhythm and dance music from Columbia's Caribbean coast....the Columbian equivalent of early Delta blues'. To boil it down, you get bongo percussion and shakers, accordions and squeezeboxes, acoustic cat-gut strung guitars and a reggae lilt. La Yegros, resident in Buenos Aires, had a single out in April with some remixes and an album out now, combining Cumbia with electronica.

Viene De Mi (Captain Planet Remix)

The original mix sounds like this...



And this is another one I'm enjoying- in fact I think I like this one the most- Trocitos...

212

I keep bumping into Azealia Bank's epic filth-fest 212- most recently in the hairdressers my daughter and wife go to when I took young ET for a haircut on Saturday. Over the din of hairdryers and phones and chat the key lines in this were still unmistakable. No-one seemed to notice- just background noise. Azealia keeps running into arguments and Twitter feuds and what-not, which keeps things interesting I suppose. If she records nothing of interest ever again this song, featuring Lazy Jay, will still be enough. It is as they say NSFW.

212

Often, When I'm On The Fridge, People Tell Me To Get Off The Fridge

Mark Wynn, York's own machine-gun lyricist and chronicler of the absurdities of 21st century life, is back with not one but two new e.p.s and a brace of videos too. As he said in his email to me 'I make too much stuff'. I'm glad he does.

Mark gets called things like 'spoken word acoustic punk' and 'York based mumbler of  song and spiel'. Its determinedly lo-fi, done quickly and homemade. The cds come with handwritten booklets. This type of cottage industry thing is good so more power to Mark's elbow.

Bill Burroughs Was My Baby (one minute twenty two of lyrical gems- 'Bill Burroughs was an intellectual, he looked good in a full length coat, he wore spectacles and he knew a lot about stuff')...



And Dave Went Mental, which references Lauren Laverne and her playlist...



You can download either or both e.p.s, naming your own price, at Bandcamp, The Polar Bear Blah and Get Off The Fridge.