The "Joe Strummer Memorial" Busking Tour

One chilly afternoon in October 2008, with a biting wind blowing, Julian Cope and Black Sheep turned up at the site of the Peterloo massacre to perform the Manchester leg of his Joe Strummer Memorial Busking Tour. Over 3 days they travelled the country, busking at "UK cultural centres" (11 of 'em according to the website) - it was advertised online a couple of days before they set of and no times were advertised, so it was very much a case of hanging around and waiting for them to show up. When they did arrive, he had a brief chat with us before starting the...err...gig. It was a pleasure to meet the great man.

I decided to capture some of it on my phone and, had my hand not turned blue with the cold wind, I'd have filmed more. Still, what you have here is fairly representative. Check out the other people's videos on Youtube for other footage of this and other venues.

Here's what the Head Heritage site had to say about the choice of venue:

"On August 16^th, 1819, the huge crowd of 80,000 people, which had gathered in Manchester’s St. Peter’s Field to protest about the price of bread due to the unfairness of the new Corn Laws, were brutally attacked by cavalry fresh from the Battle of Waterloo who’d been sent to police the situation. With over 700 injured and 15 dead, the incident became known as the Peterloo Massacre and led to the forming of the Manchester Guardian."

And here's the footage I took:

And the highlight - parts 3 and 4 are one track (I missed the first 5 or 10 minutes I'm afraid) split into two, incorporating a version of Pristeen and the legendary "face solo"...

Stills from the video are also on Flickr

Destroyer - Kaputt

Now, I know this is going to divide opinion - having saxophones, soft rock and 80s pop as reference points are likely to send many people running to the hills, or assuming that there must be an "ironic" angle to the music - but this is SUCH a good album, which adds up to so much more than it's obvious influences suggest.

Check out Bay Of Pigs' singer-songwriter take on ambient house (amongst other things), Savage Night At the Opera's 'Enola Gay' referencing guitar riff or - and you'll have to trust me on this one, as it's not on the Spotify version (it's on the vinyl or UK CD version of the album) - the stunning twenty minute The Laziest River, which threatens to turn into 'The Boys Of Summer'. about 12 minutes in.

Listen to the album on Spotify: Destroyer – Kaputt

...or have a look at the lovely video for the title track...

Song Title as Photo

...don't ask me what that means

Suede

Now this is very exciting, as I've just got the fantastic reissue of Suede's debut album - 2 CDs and a DVD packed full of goodies to remind you how essential the band were. It's been remastered and no doubt some people will say that it sounds far better than the previous versions, but I'll leave that judgement to others. I liked the sound of it first time round...

Anyway, it still stands as one of THE great debut albums; a flawed classic, which now comes packed with plenty of goodies - all the associated b-sides, which at times surpass many of the tracks that made it onto the album. To The Birds, My Insatiable One, The Big Time etc. are some of the strongest songs they ever did. You also get some serviceable demos and unreleased songs to pad out the two CDs.

Best of all (for me at least) is contained on the DVD - amongst other things is a newly discovered film of the incredible Leadmill concert from February 1993. If I was one to list my top fives then this would be in my top five gigs of all time. Rescheduled from the postponed date in late 1992, the gig took place a few days after Animal Nitrate was released and caught the band just as everything started going a bit crazy and top 10 - I remember queuing up from mid afternoon outside the Leadmill in the freezing snow to make sure we got in and the whole gig just blew me away. The band are wired, the crowd are wired and Brett Anderson had to perform most of the gig topless after his shirt (blouse?) was torn to shreds some fans (not me!)

Anyway, buy it, listen to it and watch it!

One a similar note, I've also got hold of the Dog Man Star reissue, which follows the same format and approach, and contains the stunning full length (7+ minutes) version of The Wild Ones - worth the entry fee alone.

Hungover on Chorlton FM

So, Chorlton FM ends for another year and it's been a lot of fun to be involved with it. DJing at the launch party was a good, if stressful, experience (why does the equipment never work as you want it to?) and being the "producer" for a couple of That Morning Thing shows with Jonathan Darwin was another good experience - (Producer: (n) a person who does the occasional bit of tech op-ing, makes brews for guests and chats to the DJ during songs to give him something else to talk about when he's on air).

Anyway, the highlight was, naturally, the two shows that I presented...

Hungover with Accident and Emergency (10am; 22 May 2011)

Asked to put together a set of my own music (the station is all about promoting local "talent" after all), I elected to play a selection of tracks by the A+E men - Brooksoid, Radiator Boy (that's me) and Spott.

Tracklisting

Radiator Boy - Cumin In Your Ears (early version)

Brooksoid - Don’t Be Afraid (Organ Tune)

Spott - Ode to Gin

Radiator Boy - Someday

Brooksoid - Comfortable Holes

Radiator Boy - The Drop (Parts i, ii and iv)

Spott - Niblits

Brooksoid - BestFriend

Radiator Boy - Direct Cut

Spott - LV

Radiator Boy - Heavens Above

Brooksoid - Oranje-Boom

Spott - 1888

Spott - Tilted

Radiator Boy - Pearl

Brooksoid - We Are Observing Your Earth

"Cumin In Your Ears" was an experiment with Ableton software - improvised and recorded in about 5 minutes shortly before I did the show, hence the rough and ready feel to the track. I may come back to it at some point...

Listen: Hungover with Accident and Emergency 22 May 2011

Hungover with Tim Wright (10am; 29 May 2011)

Allowed back for another session, this was focussed more on music by other people, but including three of my favourites from the A+E show. Also includes my ramblings and an ident courtesy of my daughter.

Tracklisting

David Bowie - Fantastic Voyage

Meanderthals - Kunst or Ars

Bibio - Lover's Carvings

Radiator Boy - Pearl

Bill Drummond - Julian Cope is Dead

Julian Cope - Robert Mitchum

Can - I'm So Green

Spott - Ode to Gin

Lambchop - This Corrosion

Balanescu Quartet - The Model

Brooksoid - We Are Observing Your Earth

Fujiya and Miyagi - Collarbone

Caribou - Melody Day (Four Tet Remix)
The Flaming Lips - Phoebe Battles The Pink Robots

Steve Mason - Am I Just a Man

The Zombies - The Way I Feel Inside

Brian Eno - On Some Faraway Beach

Listen: Hungover with Tim Wright 29 May 2011

Transient Random-Noise Bursts With Announcements

My favourite album by Stereolab, one of my favourite bands. It brings together the band's love of krautrock, 60s garage and easy listening, whilst striking the perfect balance between experimentation, repetition, melody and marxism (probably) - managing to be both derivative and innovative.

It's also housed in one of my favourite record covers, so I was pleasantly surprised to find that the band like to wear their influences on their record sleeves too - I picked this up from King Bee Records today, "Hi Fi Sound Stereo Test Record" from 1974.

Even the track names (or "tests" as the album calls them) could be Stereolab titles. my favourite being side one, test 2: "Lateral modulation for determination of tracking pressure in conjunction with bias correction".

Lovely.

Record Store Day 2011

So, another year, another successful record store day, but the question is – what next? Looking at the number of people queuing up outside record shops, and the number of exclusive records that were release for the day, it did remind me a bit of valentines day – a lovely sentiment, but surely people should be making the effort all year round. It’s all very well people spending a heap of cash on records one day a year, but that alone isn’t going to keep the independent record stores afloat. And as for the artists and labels – much as I love them making these exclusive releases to celebrate Record Store Day, surely EVERYTHING they release should be exclusive and a little bit special. If not, why are they bothering to make or sell music?

The queue outside Piccadilly Records - Saturday 16 April 2011. 7:20am

Anyway, cynicism aside, I did pick up some good stuff although I missed out on a couple of things I really wanted (Suede 7” and the Far Out Psych 7” box set). I must get there earlier next year; I hear that some people started queuing at midnight, so I think I’ll start queuing the day before at about 5pm - whilst the shop is still open.

So, here’s the lovely records I picked up :

Arp – Pastoral Symphony remixes 12”

Franz Ferdinand – Covers 12” EP (Debbie Harry, Stephen Merrit, LCD Soundsystem, ESG and Peaches all covering FF songs)

KORT – Please Don’t Touch 7”

Yeasayer – End Blood 7”

Clinic – Ladies Night 10” EP

Mute Records’ Vorwarts LP&CD

Some were even on lovely coloured vinyl. Mmm mmmm

The couple in front of me each bought a copy of the Radiohead 12” – the last 2 in the store – I presume this was either to sell one on ebay, or they were hedging their bets about the long term prospects of their relationship and didn’t want the headache of sorting out who owns which records at some future date.

Nice to see so many of the records already going for a fortune on ebay too – I’m sure that will do wonders for the independent record stores.

Oh, and I also got this excellent bag, which came with a free mix CD (or was it a mix CD with a free bag?). I think it sums up the day quite well.