Stylus Stories

Every Record tells a story...

I have never really been one for taking photographs, they seem clumsy reminders to me. When you pull out a camera everyone instinctively acts a little more guarded and a photo (as we all know), can make you look good or bad depending on your luck. I have a phonographic memory, every record I own is internally referenced in my brain and that enables me to hark back to not only the look of the day but the feelings that surrounded me when I first heard it. Turns out I'm not the only one who thinks like this.

Stylus Stories is a monthly gathering of music lovers which asks the public to pick up to two records that mean something to them personally and then tell everyone about them. An idea which is frankly genius in its simplicity and brings together music fans of all ages from 18-80. Unrehearsed public speaking isn't for everyone but this beautifully naive event speaks from the heart and I have to say I found it one of the most life affirming nights I have attended in years. I heard stories from the 50's, 60's, 70's, 80's and indeed 90's in one evening and such was the warmth and trust in the room that we arrived as strangers and left as friends. 

I told two stories, one about Tin Machine (David Bowie) which you can listen to on the Stylus Stories website if you search about a bit, and one featuring an altogether more dreadful record that I shall re-tell here. If you want an evening to remind you of the power of music and culture that makes each generation sing then do please dig out those dusty 45's and come along to the next event, I promise its an uplifting experience. 

Join in the fun at the next 'Stylus Stories':
Friday 6th of September, from 7.30pm, at The Great Northern Railway Tavern, 67 High Street, Hornsey N8 7QB

https://www.facebook.com/StylusStories

My 'Stylus Story': Ramirez "La Gallinero (a.k.a. The Chicken Song)"

People of a certain age will know what I'm talking about when I say that the 90's were the most fantastic, rebellious, ridiculous and downright dangerous of good old days. Anyone who was involved in the free rave scene back in the day will still carry a flame for the feelings we all shared. One of my favourite things to do is spot an old raver. You can see them hiding in the modern camouflage - all suited and booted like a grown up. But once you spot them you get the joy of blowing their cover, there's always a furtive and knowing wink involved. They aren't hard to spot either, once you know what you are looking for. All it takes is a snippet of hardcore, a casual reference to vinyl or the merest mention of 'Vicks Vapo-rub' and their eyes glaze over - the memories flood back to a time when roof licking happiness was the minimum requirement for a night out.

Great Days.

That's not to say everything about the rave days was great, much of it was self serving hedonism, some of the fashion was deeply iffy (Global Hypercolor anyone?), even the most ardent of DJs would have to admit that some of the music was cheesy enough to make sandwiches with. 

No-one said that the 'Stylus Stories' had to feature good music however and tempting though it was to select some high brow concept album as my offering, I decided the key element was the story rather than the tune. As a result I have selected one of the era's less notable soundscapes - that of 'El Gallinero' by Ramirez, a Spanish DJ and amateur ornithologist with a penchant for Chickens.  

As a keen student of music and social politics (everyone was in the 80's), I had grown up impatient for my generation's musical movement - the 50's had rock & roll, the 60's psychedelia, the 70's had a three way split of funk, prog-rock and eventually punk. The 80's (in which I was cast) seemed less forthcoming. 

Looking back now the revisionists would have you believe the 80's were a time of carefree electro pop, all high shoulder pads and cocaine parties but the truth is a million miles away from that. Outside the 'city' real life was in fact pretty depressing. My recollections of the 80's revolve around 'Protect and survive' adverts which encouraged you to survive a nuclear war by painting yourself white and hiding under a door for the winter, mass unemployment blighting large parts of the country and a critically fractured society of haves and have nots. For my generation there really was no togetherness, we aligned ourselves with the thinnest of sub genres simply to make it clear we were not part of the status quo - or indeed Status Quo. Indie actually meant that the artist was on an independent label rather than being a catch all phrase to market weak guitar music. In a way the fact we had an indie scene at all shows how disconnected the music industry had got from the fans.

I began to dispair at my parents bad timing. By the end of the 80's nothing of any consequence had happened in my market town, it was starting to look like nothing ever would ... but then, at the fag end of 1989 someone took me to an 'acid house party'. At last this otherworldly electronic music drew together a generation who had really had enough of real life's eternal bullshit.

It was the shock of the new, by the spring of 1990 the entire world had flipped on its axis. Now we were RAVERS. For the first time in living memory my friends were not dressed entirely in black, people were smiling and there was a party every night of the week.

Raving brought everyone together, inner city kids mixing with market town rejects, black, white, rich and poor. We would roam around the Cotswolds like a heard of electrified wildebeast excitedly looking for the next watering hole of liquid bass. At first the Police were OK with it, there was never any trouble at our parties, the vibe was exemplary. Most encounters with the boys in blue revolved around confused traffic cops who really just wanted an easy life parked up in a sleepy lay by. Frankly these country cops didn't know what hit them as thousands of day-glo night trippers swarmed along the back roads en masse. In the early days their policy was simply to help us get to where we wanted to go, anything to get us off their patch. True community policing really, but it could never last - especially when Fleet Street newspapers began to whip themselves into a frenzy regarding this dangerous and sinister trend for young adults to gather together and dance about a bit.

Soon anyone invloved with the free rave scene became marked men. Throwing parties became a dramatic game of cat and mouse, organisers found their phones tapped, cars followed and civil liberties in short supply. In short the government got worried and soon changed the law in such a way that simply playing music 'characterised by a repetitive beat' outside was a criminal offence. Ravel's 'Bolero' would never be played 'al fresco' again.

One thing that never changed however was the 'joie de vivre' of the raving community. The will to party was unstoppable, come rain or shine we gathered, driving round roadblocks, climbing over walls, thinking and acting as one Borg-like techno machine. 

For their part the Police began to get nastier, the tactics became ever more confrontational. When the dreaded Criminal Justice Bill was passed they could finally hit us where it hurt most - deep in the 18' bass bins. The new law meant that equipment could now be seized on a whim and held for weeks at a time without redress. The party could only go on if everyone stuck together and I remember several times total strangers were entrusted with taking away one speaker each to avoid the system being impounded, never losing so much as a lead.

It was after an extended run of killer parties that life began to get very difficult, the local plod were beginning to take things personally. The boys in blue became familiar faces, the Thames Valley force in particular warned us 'next time would be our last time'. We were having far too much fun to stop now though.

Foxing the fuzz in those halcyon days when access to a mobile phone could make you into a criminal mastermind in minutes wasn't too hard. We could change the meeting point in a minute - the age of telecommunications was definitely on our side. One particular night where we got one over on the party poopers will live long in the memory. 

That night we (literally) had a barnstorming party - the posse was strong and the Police were (literally) a country mile behind us (again). Come 6am as the morning mist billowed across the eeire English countryside the unmistakable sight of a Police van loomed into view. 

The cops were forced to park some way away from the dance-floor and as they determinedly plodded their way towards us things began to look very bad. This was it, bye-bye decks, bye-bye speaker stacks, hello police cell and criminal record. We were banged to rights and we all knew it - but we were never going to go out quietly. 

As last tunes go this was going to be a requiem for our dreams, we needed one last moment of defiance - something to prove we weren't chicken. The DJ dug deep into the crate but there was no accounting for taste and the morning shifts were always a time for the less renowned spinners to take up arms. His fingers blurred as he flipped through the plastic, this could well be the last tune, at the last party we ever threw. I can only blame the euphoric nature of ecstasy for convincing him that 'El Gallinero' by Ramirez would be the sound that drew a line under our long awaited sub culture. 

As the Rozzers opened the gate the music ground to a halt, time appeared to slow down as the record slurred to a stop. The crowd was now aware of the impending shut down and some uncharacteristically disgruntled boos began to float into the ether. Then with the sun cracking a golden yolk over the countryside the rhythm controller dropped his tune.     

"COCK-A-DOODLE-DOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"

The cry of a rooster filled the air, amplified over 10,000 watts of sheer audio muscle and the 'Chicken Song', that awful cheesy slice of Eurotrash began to boom out to rapturous applause. This wasn't the era defining curtain call that some of us were expecting. No this was 6 glorious minutes of lunatic chicken clucking spread over a banging 4x4 beat. They say the worst things often bring out the best in people and I felt compelled to agree as a thousand of my peers began to squawk, cluck and crow their way around the field ...

Ramirez - "El Gallinero (a.k.a The Chicken Song)" 

Single Edit.

All together now ...

"BOK BOK BOK BOK BOK BAKKA!

BOK BOK BOK BOK BOK BAKKA!

BOK BOK BOK BOK BOK BAKKA!

BOK BOK BOK BOK BOK BAKKA!

BOK BOK BOK BOK BOK BAKKA!

BOK BOK BOK BOK BOK BAKKA!

- COCK-A-DOODLE-DOOOOO!"

The cops (understandably), were beyond baffled as a field of fluorescent ravers flapped energetically around them in what can only be described as a palpable moment of mass hysteria. It was in truth one of the most glorious and uproariously funny moments of my entire life. The sheer madness of the situation stripped away all the erstwhile authority the Police had carried with them. You could see them struggling to comprehend what was going on with each leadened step they took through this frenetic flock of chickens. 

As they approached the decks they began to shout over the cacophony at each other - desperately trying to find a way to save some face from the situation.

Cop 1: "What the fuck is going on?"

Cop 2: "DRUGS!"

Cop 3: "Should I call for back up?"

The chief officer suddenly stalled and turned on his heals to berate the younger officer:

Cop 2: "Do you really want to arrest and process 500 chickens? Cos I fucking well don't!"

Cop 1: "Its a good point well made."

And with that a discreet word was had with the DJ, he was politely asked to turn it down and warned not to come back again next week. Amazingly we had won! This all goes to prove that quality isn't everything - even a really shit Euro-cheese 12' can bring down 'The Man' given the wholehearted support of the masses. 

Rave on spring chickens, rave on.

eops

Here's another chance for you to dance with me ....

Now just to prove that there were some great rave tracks as well as some deeply cheesy ones here are five classics from back in the day:

Shades of Rhythm - Spirit of Eden (Original)

Dance Conspiracy - Dub War

Second Phase - Mentasm (Remix)

CJ Bolland - Ravesignal III 'Horsepower' (Original)

The Prodigy - Your Love (Original)

Your love indeed, good times that will never be forgotten.

HMV: Nipper was a mongrel

Before I start this blatant rant I'd like to first offer my sincere and heartfelt sympathy to the workers and customers affected by the impending death of HMV. None of this is their fault but inevitably they are the ones who will really suffer. However I feel compelled to tell the other side of the story - the story about how the decision makers behind HMV set about creating not only their own demise but also that of independent music shops across the country starting some 20 years ago. They are now reaping what they have sown. 

Last week I finally found myself being dragged kicking and screaming into the brave new digital world, David Bowie (my favourite artist), after a decade of silence suddenly decided to drop a new single. The first album I bought with my own money was a Bowie album and I have dutifully collected every major release from my local record store for the last 30+ years. I would rush home carrying my CD or vinyl like a giddy child and spend the next few hours listening to every note whilst pouring over the cover. This latest release however had none of that romance attached to it. For the first time in three decades there simply was no physical release to purchase. I logged on to iTunes, on my own, at 8am and clicked the download tab. A minute later I could hear my purchase floating out of the speakers but I couldn't touch it and I certainly couldn't file it away with the rest of my collection. Modern life is rubbish.

So you can appreciate where I am coming from - I'm romantic about my music, I'm old school - but I'm not really a luddite. It was easy and convenient from a customers point of view, just a bit hollow from a fans. The times have changed however and nothing I say will ever bring the good old days back. As long as people are *buying* their music I dont really mind what format they use - I'll always prefer my vinyl. Shortly after this damp squib of a shopping experience the news of HMV going into administration. Everyone began talking loudly about how the internet had finally killed the record shop ... but thats only half the story, as anyone who worked in a record shop will tell you the rot set in long before the internet became a genuine threat.

It seems the High Street is dead, the shop fronts act as little more than elaborate gravestones in most town centres. The only thing you might consider buying there now is a pasty and a cup of overpriced coffee. This is a sad fact for anyone of a certain age but what surprised me was the sentimental way people began to speak about HMV. There was much wailing and gnashing of teeth on the subject - Twitter was ablaze with regret and many music aficionados started recounting soft soliloquies about the last of the record shops dying. Well stop right there I say, let me tell you a little secret.

Nipper was a complete mongrel.

Forget about the curious little dog staring wistfully down the gramophone horn, I'm here to tell you that Nipper was in fact a vicious attack dog who ruthlessly savaged anyone who trod on his territory. It's territory being just about any market town that it decided to cock its leg on.

Aside from the tragic situation that the 4,000 odd shop workers and back-room staff found themselves in this week, the really terrible statistic embroiled in this HMV debacle is that 38% of all physical music media in the UK went through the tills of HMV. As the leash around Nippers neck suddenly reached the end of its tether it became clear that the loss of HMV as a sales portal was going to ruin a large part of the UK music industry. My sympathy doesn't lie with HMV however - theres a good reason why that chilling figure of 38% came about - make no mistake HMV made this bed.

Long before the internet took a hold of our lives the rot had already set in. Years ago in the 80's and early 90's most towns had at least one record shop. Most of the time that shop was a small 'Mom & Pop' shop that had roots in its community and a deep commitment to the culture it peddled. Record shops were where musicians met up, it was where the adverts to form a band were stuck to the wall with chewing gum, it was where a dedicated team of music nerds would help guide you through the many releases available each week and set you on a path to musical emancipation. Independent stores served their local community, the music industry ruefully dealt with these tiny and often obscure emporiums - but it was never going to last.

HMV (and their ilk), brought big business into the equation. With a chain of shops the major labels found life became much easier to deal with. The economy of scale, the simplification of distribution and money-spinning switch to CD's all began to combine into a perfect storm.

When HMV came to your town everything looked new and shiny (even the music), these shops were smart, they had metal racks, proper window displays and total backing from the major labels. With so many old school record shops being truly independent the likes of HMV could simply steam roll the competition.

Together the majors and the big chains began to slice up the music marketplace. Indie stores simply couldn't compete and HMV (especially), had a clear policy of undercutting their rivals and setting their own agenda. Label reps would often come into our shop and tacitly admit that they were fixing the charts in conjunction with HMV. To ensure a high chart position on the week of release they would literally give HMV boxes of records and CD's to flog on to the customer for 99p a pop. Smaller shops were forced to swallow their pride and raid the bargain bins of HMV just so they could afford to stock the newest releases. It would cost our shop £1.29 per unit to order (in bulk) the latest chart hits, yet HMV were getting it all for free? Of course once the song had charted the demand rose and the labels would make their money back - but not through the independents.

This behaviour had a number of unwanted side effects, shops began to close but perhaps more crucially the charts ceased to be taken seriously. HMV and co began to scramble the golden egg. The market became distorted and the number one spot became meaningless to a large proportion of the record buying public.

As the local shops began to drop like flies the very culture on which the industry was built on began to look paper thin. The indies briefly fought back by clubbing together to form 'The chain with no name' in an effort to counteract the policies of the big names. There was a short period when the term 'Indie music' actually meant something - HMV simply turned the phrase to their own advantage and began to use 'Indie' as a genre title. Even this valiant fight back was subverted and used against the smaller shops.

So the long slow decline began - accelerated by the arrival of the internet no doubt but even then a more inclusive and forward looking attitude could of saved the High Street. HMV didn't embrace the digital age, they scoffed at it for a while ... until it was too late. Having destroyed the competition they set about destroying themselves. HMV in it's later years was less of a music shop and more of a discount warehouse for cheap DVD's and, lets face it, utter tat. I'm surprised the stores didn't explode with irony as they were reduced to selling iPods in store. Like turkeys voting for christmas they totally lost sight of what was truly important. So now the fat lady has started to sing and an astonishing 38% of physical music sales became dependant on the now mangey mut of HMV. This wasn't an accident of fate - HMV worked hard to become top dog - and they did it by screwing the rest of retail over.

I went down to the sacred store
Where I'd heard the music years before
But the man there said the music wouldn't play ...

So much for old news though - the ship has sailed, we will never see a return to the good old days.  There is some hope however. A good service still counts for something. While the sales of physical media are a fraction of what they were music still attracts true fanatics, fans that want an informed, high quality, bespoke music service. If there is one glimmer of hope in this mess it might just be the return of a few highly motivated specialist record shops. Even some of the old guard are still limping on! So if you care about this mortally wounded culture then get out there and start supporting the likes of Kristina Records Dalston, Jumbo Records in Leeds, Phonica in Soho and Vinyl Underground in Northampton. Theres a few dotted around the country and they will welcome sales by internet and post as readily as by footfall. Hell, they even pay their taxes here in a nod to the old school way of doing things.

No one will be sorrier than me to see the death of the High Street record shop - I worked in one for over a decade but I cant shed a tear for HMV. They were utter bastards back in the day. Mourn the loss of Massive, Avid, Selectadisc, Jelly Jam, Rounder, Hot Wax, Record Savings, Chalky's, Manic Hedgehog, Rays, Mole Jazz, Demand, Chockys Chewns, Uptown, Mr CD, Music Market, Movement and a whole host of others ... but don't spare a thought for the passing of the last bully standing.

Capitalism has no regard for culture and always eats itself in the long run.





     

eops Albums of the year 2012

The end of the world show ... part two.

At the turn of the Millennium I mixed a tape for a friend called “The End of the World Show” – you know ... just in case. It wasn’t very good but it got me thinking; if you were going to select tracks for the final mix before the apocalypse what would you really want to hear? Do you really want to drift into the afterlife dooming over a Joy Division riff? It might be more fun to go out punching the air shouting “Lager, Lager, Lager”?

2012 was slated to bring the end of days but as any self respecting Mayan will tell you predicting an apocalypse is a tricky business. The fact is that doomsday will almost certainly arrive when you least expect it to. It’s frankly unlikely you will have had time to prepare your ideal soundtrack to oblivion. I clearly wasn’t ready for the world to end this year but if I had drifted into the afterlife last Friday then this is what I would have been listening to.

10 Brother Sun, Sister Moon: Brother Sun, Sister Moon (Denovali Records) 

Brother Sun, Sister Moon: All you need.

This beautifully packaged gem on Denovali Records is a daydreamers delight. Drenched in sunshine and recorded completely in soft focus by Roof Lights’ Gareth Munday, the album features the breathy vocal talents of Alicia Merz from Birds of Passage. I loved its quirky psychedelia, clever use of field recordings and Drake-like guitar pickings drowning in the reverb alongside some wonderfully subtle breaks. It’s post Trip-hop warmth mixes perfectly with a Slowdive like Indie sound that stares resolutely at its shoes despite the summery feel.

9 Toy – Toy (Heavenly Records) 

Toy: Motoring.

There's a lot of music industry chatter about Toy - so much so it got quite off putting long before I'd heard a note of actual music. Like their fellow haircuts 'The Horrors' they are often reviled for being ‘scenesters’ (whatever that actually means). It’s a shame because that sort of talk really distracts from a well thought out and perfectly executed exercise in Gothic tinged UK Psyche. It took me a while to lean in to their sound but after hunkering down into the glory hole that is ‘Kopter’ I found myself yearning to slip into a pair of drainpipe jeans and poorly buttoned paisley shirt. Luckily for you I resist this urge but I am happy to listen to it whatever anyone says.

8 Mala: Mala in Cuba (Brownswood Recordings) 

Mala: Changuito.

Mala is serious about his music that attracts a certain type of poe-faced critic, I read one review of this LP that bemoaned the fact 'Mala in Cuba' had failed to become ‘coffee table Dubstep’ album for the masses. It went on to complain that the music was sample driven and that Mala should have used longer passages from his Cuban recordings to show off the musicality of the people that played for him. If you will pardon my vernacular: WTF? This for me is exactly why the album is so successful, not a reason to look down on it. Mala remains true to the music he helped create; the samples are clipped and frame the basslines like all the best Dubstep tracks. This gives them a potent urgency that would surely be lost if the project were to become some sort of Buena Vista Social Club museum piece. As the saying goes – you can take the boy out of Croydon, but you cant take Croydon out of the boy, Mala in Cuba is all the better for it. 

7 Tame Impala: Lonerism (Modular Recordings) 

Tame Impala: Elephant.

Tame Impala peddle the sort of tripped out sonics that should be a perfect fit for me but despite enjoying their first effort ‘Innervisions’ I felt it was all a bit too derivative of the Beatles melody wise. Ask Liam and Noel – that shit doesn’t last. However ‘Lonerism’ fully rights that wrong. This is now a mature sound being made by a confident producer. Confident enough to glam it up a bit in places and still drop the tempo earnestly when required. In fact it makes me want to shake my big grey trunk all up in your face.

6 Ty Segall: Twins (Drag City) 

Ty Segall: Would you be my love?

Some of my favourite musicians are absolute perfectionists who painstakingly produce inch perfect pop records over months, years and sometimes decades of self imposed studio isolation. Unfortunately the best way to ruin the intended spirit of any song is to overproduce it and that leaves a thin line between perfecting the magnum opus and obsessively polishing a turd. Ty Segall knows that sometimes its better to thrash something out with feeling then release it warts and all than to deprive the world of a few rough edges for the sake of musical vanity. Twins is an audio bulldozer with a wrecking ball attached, it contains some genuinely melodic moments that can charm the pants off you but it delivers them with the sort of gusto you would expect of a rowdy garage blues man drinking JD straight from the bottle. Play it loud.

5 Death Grips: The Money Store (Epic Records) 

Death Grips: The fever (aye, aye).
Whilst in my everyday life I am a mild mannered company man politely ghosting my way through society I do, on occasion, get an overwhelming urge to set fire to famous buildings and run amok through the streets. This sort of teenage blood lust requires a soundtrack suitably enraged with contempt for the norm. Death Grips are the first band I’ve heard in a long time that genuinely sounded threatening on first listen. Sounding truly shocking is an extremely difficult thing to do in the modern world, but Death Grips storm out of the speakers to desecrate your ears with aplomb. Most importantly whilst some may argue this sound is closer connected to Punk, Juke and Ghetto-Tech than Hip-Hop, this is the first ‘rap’ album that has truly surprised me in years evoking memories of the first time I heard Public Enemy or N.W.A. It's also been a joy to watch 'Epic Records' take the massive risk of signing such a militant artist and then watch helplessly as Death Grips impatiently released their follow up album 'No Love Deep Web' against their wishes on the Internet for free. It's every bit as powerful as 'The Money Store' and features a cover that shows the title written large in marker pen across a band members, 'member' (yes, his penis.) Classy stuff there from MC Ride and company, you go tell the man! If you were a teenager today this shit would definitely annoy and alienate your parents – I can think of no higher praise. 

4 Actress: RIP (Honest Jon’s Records)

Actress: N.E.W.

Detroit, Chicago, Sheffield, London, Berlin … techno reviews often sound like a travelogue of post industrial cities to which the roots of electronica are retraced for reference points but the real truth behind great electronic music is that if done correctly the best techno sounds like it wasn’t even made on this planet. Actress (British producer Darren J. Cunningham) is prime example of some fresh thinking livening up a genre prone to repetition (literally). It’s hard to put your finger on exactly how Actress perform this trick but its clearly more than smoke and mirrors. R.I.P. is a deep, thoughtful album reminiscent of Boards of Canada or Speedy J in their pomp. The lines are clean and controlled; in its quieter moments songs like ‘N.E.W’ draw the listener in like a sonic tractor beam. So let’s not dwell on Earthly locations like London and Detroit – lets just sit back and enjoy the ride.

3 Grizzly Bear: Shields (4AD) 

Grizzly Bear: Gun shy.

Grizzly Bear recently claimed that their audience in Europe was ‘too old and too male’. It’s a fair cop I suppose but think on young cubs, as Tony Soprano would say, “You don’t shit where you eat”.  I can see why HMV's £50 man appreciates this sophisticated music. Its cool but you could slip it on at a dinner party and no one would complain, you could then look pretty hip waxing lyrical about them from the confines of the kitchen. It encourages the old school indie boys to do a bit more paunch gazing but we shouldn't hold that against it. The music on Shields is simply wonderful in places and I love the way it melts through your thoughts at the end of the evening. It's like the last sip of red wine dissolving on the back of your tongue, you want to savour it and hold it in your mouth because you know when it’s gone so is the moment. 

2 Liars: WIXIW (Mute) 

Liars: Brats.

When an indie band announces that their next LP will see them ‘go electronic’ it can be easy to accidentally blind yourself by rolling your eyes too hard. It’s a very difficult transition to make and one that is often severely underestimated by already successful musicians. However when it works it can free a band from the shackles of expectation and see them transcend their genre. Liars, like Radiohead before them have got the transition spot on. Just like ‘Kid A’ this was a squid like attempt at deliberate obfuscation and 'WIXIW' is an inky pool of an album. There is more than a touch of desafinado in this selection. The whole experience is claustrophobic, keyboards detune and the lyrics paint a bleak scene over sparse deliberate rhythms. This isn’t the record your life coach will want to add to the motivational playlist. What life coaches don’t get is that sometimes you want to wallow in the darkness; sometimes you need to make space for yourself to be depressed and deal with stuff before you hop along the yellow brick road. Music can be the best companion in the darkest days. As black as the cover it comes in 'WIXIW' is an ebony gem and even though the melancholy is Dickensian, Liars are not a one note band and they even manage to make time for a bit of 'Bleak House' on the sublime 'Brats'. Play it on your own.

1 Shackleton: Music for the Quiet Hour/The Drawbar Organ EP's (Woe to the septic heart!) 

Shackleton: Music for the quiet hour (Part three).

When you are forever snuffling for truffles in the musical orchard sometimes you need to remind your inner truffle pig exactly what you are looking for. The ideal outcome for me is to find something unexpected and yet familiar, after all, great music is an evolution, with artists standing on the shoulders of giants. That said it has to move things on. It doesn’t have to be fashionable or even successful – it just has to amaze the listener in some way and perhaps capture something of the time. Music is a time based medium and yet its often not judged in the same way a film is. Too often music is seen as something can just be ‘on’ … ‘in the background’ … ‘Heart FM’. In a cinema everyone would sit through something light and easy, lot of people will chance a horror film, some will invest time in a moving documentary and a few will take in an art house movie. What everyone does is sit in the dark with their phones off for two hours essentially concentrating on the film. I always feel its so sad that so few people attempt to do this with music, Gil Scott-Heron agrees. 

Music for the Quiet Hour is not an easy listen. Producer Sam Shackleton deliberately agitates the listener with an armoury of studio tricks. Endlessly rising Shepard Tones ratchet up the tension, the use of stereo is dizzying and the oft' forgotten art of dynamic production provides peaks to every trough. There are points when you feel truly unsettled by the music, but its worth remembering that to really feel the release of music you need to endure the build up – as I said it’s a 'time based medium'. This is a unique piece of work and should be endured and ultimately enjoyed as if it was a dark science fiction screening that demands your attention. You only need do it once – go on, I promise it will be much more rewarding than Avatar. You might love it, you might hate it … but either way you really can’t deny its power and craft.

Compilation of the year:

Jeff Mills – Sequence: A Retrospective of Axis records (Axis)

Techno, techno, techno … but not as you know it, eminently listenable and perfectly judged tunes created by the 'Wizard' – Jeff Mills: Godfather of techno.

Reissue of the year:

My Bloody valentine: Isn’t anything/Loveless/EP’s 1988-1991 (Sony)

Seminal noise pop barely covers it, these are stone cold classics and in many ways the EP’s combine to create a long lost MBV LP for those that missed the vinyl first time round.

Nearly ran’s …

They were lots of great albums this year but I don’t have time to review them all so to save space I shall précis the 'best of the rest' in Haiku form.

Sharon Van Etten: Tramp (Jagjaguar)

Singer Songwriters

Normally Irritating

This one is quite good 

Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti: Mature themes (4AD)

Mercurial guy

Incoherent bontempi

To be expected 

Carter Tutti Void: Tranverse (Mute)

Factory/Gristle

An ’art’ collaboration

Synthesiser porn 

Godspeed you! Black Emperor: 'Allelujah! Don't Bend! Ascend! (Constellation)

Canadian band

Better than Nickleback eh?

SONIC CATHEDRAL! 

Dexys: One day I’m going to soar (BMG)

Twenty-seven years

Rowland talks all over it

It’s rather a shame 

Any other business?

Well ... I like to think I did pretty well with my 3 to watch in 2012 blog.

While Addison Groove’s debut LP didn’t quite hit the spot, labels like Swamp 81, Hemlock and Hessle Audio have hit a rich vein of form producing some of the most interesting dance music around.

Roof Light had a hand in the excellent Brother Sun, Sister Moon LP as I mentioned above but there were also a couple of skittish house tracks and simply beautiful 12" on Styrax under the moniker GhostLight.

But I take all the credit for giving early props to … 

Throwing Snow

Throwing Snow: Perca (Taken from the Clamor EP).

Throwing Snow really began to make a mark this year with a session for Radio1Xtra, remixes galore, critical acclaim and a new label at his disposal. The Clamor and Aspera EP’s were rich and varied 4 trackers that had real finesse to them. Snow Ghosts the much-anticipated collaboration with Augustus Ghost should appear soon and I have feeling 2013 will see Ross Tones and company go from strength to strength.

Thanks for reading – please buy your music if you really like it. I don't want to encourage the use of Spotify but I'm sure you will find most of the artists featured on there if you search.

Also …

I seem to manage about three posts a year on here so I’ll try and up the work-rate somewhat with smaller posts that require little or no forethought.

Meanwhile I’d welcome your recommendations for the doomsday mix-tape, 'Haiku Reviews', comments, shares and RTs.

Here’s to the next thing that makes us go: O_O

@eops

eops 'The Goth Years'

So I wrote a blog for My Band T-Shirt all about my beloved Bauhaus T and the sad demise of my T-shirt collection not long ago. I got a lot of great feedback about whats essentially quite a personal story so I thought I'd re-post it here for posterity. 

Strange as it seems before the Raving I was a black-dyed-in-the-wool Goth. Winkle-picker boots, leather jacket, flowery shirt and jet black eye liner. It was great. The greatness was not necessarily in being a Goth but rather in being able to look in the mirror and know that whatever I was, I wasn't one of 'them' ... 'normal people'. 

It wasn't easy either... I had curly ginger hair that didn't respond well to hair gel. I had to slick it all back with soap, blow-dry it, then furiously back comb and crimp it to get the right effect (Mac from Echo & The Bunnymen was my 'dream look'). This system worked well until it rained, then I would begin to froth at the scalp and expunge a strange smell of soapy apples, oh yes, I was a keeper. It kept me fit too, mostly because of all the running I did. I pretty much ran everywhere to avoid being beaten to death by a small town Gorilla in loafers and a 'casual' shirt.  

But you know what? Despite the constant threat of being found in a frothy pool of blood and apple scented soap I loved being a Goth, I met some great people and went to some amazing gigs, I also got to wear make up, get off with girls in suspenders and look miserable without reproach. Anyway this is how is all started...

My Band T-Shirt: Bauhaus, "eyes"

When I was a kid I felt surrounded by uniforms.

They were everywhere it seemed, my Father was in the American Air Force and we lived on a Military Base where literally everyone had a uniform of some description.

We were a staunch Roman Catholic family so there was no escape even at the weekend. We would dutifully go to Church and Sunday School where flamboyant priests wore their vestments as a badge of holy authority, Nuns would herd us around like spiritual penguins and if you were good you might get selected as an altar boy and get to put on a frock yourself. 

As a very young kid it never bothered me, I could see they were a different breed to me. Even when I dressed up in my Sunday best there was a certain flamboyant 70’s style that made my get up individual, if garish.

Like any parent my Mom had phases of dressing us up in matching clothes. We did everything; matching silk Bomber Jackets (that made us look like refugees from a bowling team), identical Sky-Lab themed cardigans (that any Shoreditch Hipster would give their right arm for now), and the high water mark of 70’s kids wear, a vomitus rainbow patterned Nylon jump suit thing that both me and my brother were ‘actually photographed in’ one Easter.

It was exciting at first but eventually the sheer amount of well meaning comments we got began to make us kids suspicious. There was just an inkling brewing that we may have looked like idiots.

Oh the 70s.

As we neared the end of the 70’s we moved to England and after a further year of American education I was shipped wholesale into an English Catholic School (run by Irish Nuns naturally). It was never going to be easy, I was a snotty kid, I had an American accent and … I was ginger.

You might think a school uniform would act as a leveler to these outsider feelings but kids are way to sharp for that. Kids know when you don’t belong. Even my uniform was odd; my buttons were bigger than the English kids’ buttons. My shirts were short sleeved, my tie latched around my neck like an angry blue & white python and my feet were shod in the most ridiculous cowboy boots that added an audio clumsiness to my already wonky demeanor.

I was not happy about the switch to England. I was a Giraffe at a Zebra party. My Mother thought the best policy was to encourage me to join in with various after school activities. I’d seen my brother in the American boy scouts so it seemed sensible to join the Cubs. However my uniform was again cobbled together, imagine my shame when I was the only boy without a regulation woggle. Having 30 English kids taking the piss out of your woggle was beyond the pale.

So there I was, … still surrounded by uniforms. Priests would visit the house and act like I should know them but then the Nuns would then destroy my self-confidence daily at school. At the weekends, I would sit outside the officers club on the Air Base with a warm bottle of coke listening to my Dads Air Force buddies get the best of the attention I craved from my Master Sergeant Father.

The only thing ‘uniform’ about my relationship with uniforms was alienation.

The only places far enough removed from my reality to allow me to relax in were in ‘my prayers’ and in ‘my music’. After all David Bowie was even more alien than Jesus and he had a much better back catalogue to explore.

There it was the road to salvation, no, not the religion, the music.

My interest in religion peaked around 16 or 17. Every time I could feel the church soothing my soul I seemed to find another uniformed hypocrite discrediting all I had learned. Passive aggression, twisting guilt and blatant sinning was the order of the day. Finally a hushed up sex scandal involving the local priest (but not me thank goodness) made me decide the uniforms had to go.

So what does a young boy do? I still didn’t want to be alone; I just wanted to fit in.

The logic ran thus: If I don’t fit in there MUST be others who don’t fit in…

WHERE DO THEY FIT IN? … Or not, if you follow me.

David Bowie did eventually bring the answer, but only indirectly. It was the Bauhaus cover version of Ziggy Stardust that really made the change, it was an unlikely Top40 hit and they looked MENTAL on Top of the Pops. 

I began to spot a trend amongst my older sisters’ friends, there was a look developing, it was black, it was scruffy and it featured Peter Murphy’s eyes.

Long before I could bump into a gig or indeed clothes shop for myself I began to lust after that Bauhaus shirt with the eyes. The only people who wore that shirt were misfits, dropouts, and freaks!

I began to cut away from the pop music of my peers. I remember playing ‘The Psychedelic Furs’ to a bemused mate on the day he bought ‘Uptown Girl’ by Billy Joel – I don’t think he never came round again. While my brothers went on to join the US Navy my sister and I joined CND. I crimped my curly ginger hair straight (which looked as ridiculous as it sounds), then, after a lifetime of waiting, at last, the ‘sixth form’ came along and with it my release from compulsory uniform.

A compulsory uniform that I duly swapped wholesale for another, but this time a dark gothic one that offended my teachers’ eyes. I found a mail order catalogue that sold me winkle-picker boots, a leather jacket, drainpipe jeans, a studded belt and of course … Peter Murphy’s eyes!

My life became a stream of gigs and T-shirts, each time I returned late to school I felt even more of a freak … but now I began to relish it! I remember being told I couldn’t take Holy Communion in a Jesus and Mary Chain T-shirt despite being the only kid in my class who still went to mass on a Sunday. I was pushed further and further away from dogma and compliance and it felt good!

Then there was a moment of clarity at Reading Festival when I looked around and thought:

“I have never seen so many GINGERS in one place! My people …I HAVE FOUND YOU!”

So anyway, coming back to the point - when I found out about the blog My Band T-Shirt I felt compelled to write something. Alas it took longer than anticipated because at one point in my mid 20’s I had stumbled into a very sensible relationship and something terrible happened.

My then partner was not a freak. She was a nice girl. She was doing her ‘wild rebellion’ like a poorly paid gap year when she met me and it soon became apparent that she expected me to grow up with her when it was over.

Things had already changed; Rave had broken the monotonous uniform of black clothing and drainpipe jeans that carried me into the 90s. Instead we began to sweat our individuality into our Global Hyper-Colour tops. That was a sea change for me but for her it was just the start of a new direction.

She bought me a suede blazer jacket to replace my painted leather jacket. She began to ask questions about what ‘we’ were going to do about all my old T-Shirts. The alarm bells were ringing but she (being handy with a needle) offered to ‘make them into something’, she would sew them into a patchwork blanket thing so I didn’t have to throw them out (an offer forced into existence by my refusal to do the latter). So I ruefully gave her all my shirts.

Soon our life together began to drag, plans were being made, events were being dutifully attended and even her Airline Pilot Father complimented me on a pair of sensible shoes I was asked to wear.

I could see the uniforms coming to get me and I wasn’t going to go out like that. I panicked and split with the girl – she, to the best of my knowledge, burned my rebellious shirts. At the time it didn’t really matter, I knew I could never go back to those days anyway, life had moved on. Please don’t get me wrong, she was a lovely girl, but she had a very different outlook from me, it was always doomed.

So anyway, when I decided to write something for the blog I journeyed deep into the heart of my wardrobe but the pickings were awfully slim.

There was no Wedding Present ‘Russian Tour’, no My Bloody Valentine ‘Kiss’, no embarrassing Gene Loves Jezebel, Mission or Balaam & the Angel T’s. In fact apart from solitary Loop shirt (Id been wearing that fateful day), there was almost nothing to tell My Band T-Shirt about.

Then like a time team special – just when I thought I had nothing to show and tell, I found a relic of the past. Hidden in a bag that vaguely whiffed of Petula oil was my very own ‘Shroud of Turin’. A faded face looking out at me 30 years on, a testament to my faith in the freaks … my band T-shirt has Peter Murphy’s eyes.

And finally a fistful of Gothic... 

5 Tunes from the dark days: 

Sisters Of Mercy - Temple of Love

Bauhaus - Spirit

Siouxsie & the Banshees - Staircase Mystery

The Cramps - You got good taste (Live)

The Cure - All cats are grey