Festival Time

The season of festivals is upon us with more than ever to choose from. The good news is that there are plenty of things to see that provide a refreshing alternative to standing in a corporate-sponsored field drinking warm, overpriced and watered-down lager watching corporate indie bands. Here are just a few.
The annual Sonar festival in Barcelona [...]

Album: STARS OF THE LID - And The Refinement Of Their Decline (Kranky KRANK100 2007)

“I simply feel that they are making the most important music of the 21st century.” That bold claim by Ivo Watts-Russell has been used in the advanced publicity of this album, bringing to mind the hubris of “I have seen the future of rock ‘n’ roll and its name is Bruce Springsteen” and all the [...]

Song of the day: NOMEANSNO - The Graveyard Shift (2000)

Sometimes Nomeansno can be really annoying. They are responsible for some of the most visceral, angry, complex and intelligent music ever to be tarred with the broad brush of punk rock. They can also dick around like a dumb-cartoon band. The two chord ice-hockey obsessed nerdishness is fine when it appears on a Hanson Brothers [...]

Album: TARWATER - Spider Smile (Morr Music 073 2007)

The duo of Ronald Liphook and Bernd Jestram are up to album number seven with the release of Spider Smile, the second for Berlin label Morr Music. Tarwater’s trademark has always been an analogue sounding electronic music that seems an era away from the gleaming laptops of many of their contemporaries. Increasingly, though, they have married [...]

Song of the day: FRANK SINATRA - I Get Along Without You Very Well (1955)

Now here’s something very old and very sad. Hoagy Carmichael based the words of “I Get Along Without You Very Well” on an anonymous poem that had been just signed JB. He gave it a tune and published it in 1939. It wasn’t until 1952 when he sang it with Jane Russell in the film [...]

Song of the day: MICROWAVE PRINCE - The Eternal Light (1995)

The Microwave Prince was German techno/trance producer Steffen Müller-Gartner who seems to have disappeared after being fairly active between 1993 and 1998. “Eternal Light” first appeared on his only album, A Captive In The Land Of The Iron Bubbles (Le Petite Prince). It’s one of those albums that I’ve had an eye out for for [...]

Album: EL-P - I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead (Definitive Jux 2007)

El-P came to prominence as a member of Company Flow at the turn of the century, one of hip hop’s most forward looking and sonically adventurous acts. His first solo album proper was the well-received Fantastic Damage in 2002. Five years later he’s come up with a follow-up (although there was an instrumental collection called [...]

Song of the day: THE INVITATIONS - What’s Wrong With Me Baby (1965)

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