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Soundtracks of Our Lives 10/05/2009
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Stevo
Stevo
6664 posts

Edited May 11, 2009, 19:35
Re: Soundtracks of Our Lives 10/05/2009
May 11, 2009, 10:51
Gun Club Hamburg September 84.
The Kid/Patricia/Terry Graham line up about a month before Terry Graham left.
Performing material from their 1st 3 lps.
Not sure exactly when the peak of this line up fell. This is pretty good though.

Henry Cow. the other 7 discs of the box arrived Friday afternoon so I haven't had a chance to go through all of them, me being away over the weekend.
did watch the dvd which catches them at about their peak for me so far. 1976.
Now having representations of some of their later stuff I might change that. Not sure though, possibly just expand it and say they were great throughout with a few not so good patches, usually down to members being ill.
The dvd is 75 minutes of them onstage in a place called Vevey in Switzerland. Has Dagmar krause on vocals throughout including them doing a version of Phil Ochs No More songs. They also do some lengthy improvisations. Great to finally be able to see them in action.
The booklets with the box have been fascinating too, & I must see if I can get hold of Chris Cutler's book on the band.

EXTRA GOLDEN Thank You Very Quickly
Been getting more and more into this band's blend of Benga guitar and western rock. Think i'll take the plunge and get their first 2 lps.
The melodic percussive nature of the guitars reminds me a bit of Television, but what I've heard of Benga often does.
I still far prefer the African singer to the American one.

Roy Ayers Ubiquity
I got 2 of the reissues of his early 70s stuff recently, this & He's Coming.
It's been this that's been sitting on my 3changer stereo all week, think that's more accident than design though. Both are great.
Think this should probably appeal to those who love Stark Reality, & I think a couple of the sidemen are the same. Both groups use similar melodic percussion instruments processed through effects pedals.
Ubiquity does reference a little of the MOR material Ayers was playing before this in the shape of Raindrops Are Falling On My Head but I think it's a lot more funky than he was previously. There's a bit of the sound that he was producing in the Herbie Mann group with Sonny sharrock too.
Had been looking for this era of Ayers for ages, so glad it's finally been reissued.

Clay Allison several live sets.
These seem to become more electric & rocky as they progress. Not sure what the differentiation, beyond time, there was between these and Opal. Doesn't seem to be much difference in sound anyway.
There are some remnants of the folkier/more ethnicky material of the earlier stuff in the shape of their drones.
Worth investigating if you're into this post Paisley Underground stuff at all.

Henry Threadgill Live set from Italian Radio last year.
I'm not familiar with Threadgill but this set makes further investigation sound worthwhile. Nice large-ish ensemble work with great electric guitar and brass.

dvd
NICK CAVE & THE CAVEMEN Electric Ballroom '84
I sat through this initially thinking it was from spain because it was broadcast on Spanish tv. I started noticing stage comments that I recognised and started thinking it was from the Ballroom performance which was the first time I'd seen Cave live. Checked the liners on my computer and it was indeed.
So 4 songs by Cave with what was soon afterwards renamed the Bad Seeds. Not sure exactly when the changeover happened or if it was anything beyond a widespread promoting mistake at the time, with the band already calling itself differently. This is the Hugo Race/Barry adamson/blixa Bargeld/Mick harvey line up back when they were still pretty noisy.

SONIC YOUTH Later
The band does still appear to look surprisingly young. Even with Lee's greying barnet, thought it was just Thurston who had the Dorian grey thing going on.
I haven't picked up the last several lps, on the strength of this showing that might well have been a mistake.

MILES DAVIS 7,10/1967 Stadthalle Karlsruhe, Germany
The Miles Quintet still wearing suits playing a hard bop that borders the free. Nice that they were captured at a peak like this.

HENRY COW Vessey 76
I've mentioned this above but do think this is a neccessary dvd so hope it eventually gets released separately to the box set.

comics
read through all the Alan Moore Swamp Things, thought they were great but wished there were more of them. grabbed the series after Moore left but haven't looked at it yet.

Warren Ellis's Planetary, great pastiches of other existing comic series tied into a series about superpowered planetary archaeology team.

Garth Ennis' The Boys
Somewhatr scatological series about a team that monitors the excesses of superhero behaviour and tries to keep it in check. Pretty violently in most cases. Newest recruit looks like he was modelled on Simon Pegg.

Stevo
Np Sir Richard Bishop 10/3/05
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Soundtracks of Our Lives 10/05/2009 (Moon Cat)
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