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Underground > Radio & Music >

2003: What's your current musical obsession?

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The Return Of Rothkoid

23:56 / 14.01.03

New year, new thread. I thought this could do with a revival.

At the moment, I'm all about Irwin Chusid's two CDs, Songs In The Key Of Z volumes one and two. They're outsider music collections, and are fucking phenomenal, not to mention wholly, wholly cracked. A congresswoman singing about the deadly mosquito? Songs about birthmarks? The Shaggs? All there, baby. Chusid's the guy who rereleased the Langley Schools Project disc, so that should let you know where he's coming from. Fabulous and disturbing. Never doubt your ability to make music again - though I doubt I could ever be as cool as Shooby Taylor.

Also, currently digging on Smog's Dongs of Sevotion and Rain On Lens - two paranoid, quiet albums that have wormed their way in. Bill Callaghan is, as ever, a fucked-up dude.

Another one: Joel Silbersher's Greasy Lens. For the ex-punk and Hoss mainman, a surprisingly good assortment of tunes. Fingerpicked, a lot, with some drummer backbone making the mix work. Larrikinism prevails somewhat (cf "I Miss Your Big White Bum", which isn't anything like you imagine it would be, given the title) but it's a great collection - I hope he follows this for a while.

Of course, the Django Reinhardt and Louis Armstrong discs are getting a workout, too. Reinhardt is just a 3-CD cheapo bargain-shop collection, but the Armstrong is the JSP Hot 5s and 7s remaster set - 'tis fucking fab.

Matthew Fluxington

00:12 / 15.01.03

Rothkoid, have you read the book version of Songs In The Key Of Z, or listened to the archives of Irwin Chusid's Incorrect Music show on WFMU? There's a lot more than what's on those compilations, for sure. The book is urgent and key, though.

Also, I've got to hook you up with some more Shooby...I'll make a note of that. Did you know that Shooby was recently found? There's an interview with Shooby conducted in part by Irwin Chusid here, and some previously unreleased Shooby recordings are played during the broadcast.

Oh - and if that's the only Jandek song you've ever heard, I've got to tell you that there's WAY better Jandek music than that. Chusid intentionally picked an especially dire and grating one because he was trying to push a negative view of Jandek on his audience. I really think you'd like a lot of Jandek's music, actually.

10:01 / 15.01.03

One word: Psychedelia.
Perhaps not deliberately, but a constantly recurring theme in a load of my favourite records at the moment, as the Byrds, the West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band, 13th Floor Elevators, HP Lovecraft, the early Flaming Lips reissues, Slumber Party, Acid Mothers Temple and Neutral Milk Hotel all clamour for a place in my ears.

Another two words: HERMAN DUNE. Can't say enough good things about Herman Dune.. they're just lovely in every possible way..

And a few more words for luck: Leonard Cohen. Why have I not heard this man before? Precisely how much does he rock?

21:44 / 15.01.03

I cant believe you've never heard of Leonard Cohen. He rocks sooo much that by his very rocking he redifines what it is to rock. His poetry aint that shabby either.

My latest musical obsession was Billie Holliday and Eva Cassidy

Brigade du jour

21:50 / 15.01.03

Rock'n'roll Nostalgia, dudes.

22:42 / 15.01.03

Recent blow-out on Soul Jazz stuff has resulted in complete addiction to their Voodoo Drums recording. Hypnotic.

Rollo Kim, on location

10:16 / 16.01.03

Psycoustics!

And [Psychedelia] The Fire's 'Father's name is Dad'. And Lonnie Liston Smith's 'Expansions' - two tracks that have been on my mind for years and took as long to find. [You know how it sounds but you don't know what it's called or who it's by!]

ONLY NICE THINGS

10:36 / 16.01.03

William Walton's Anon in Love, which is rather a happy, shiny thing - a set of anonymous British love songs rescored. Oh, and I've come late to the party with All Hands on the Bad One by Sleater-Kinney, which rocks very hard indeed. Bands who namecheck the Merrimac and the Monitor are generally to be applauded, I feel.

10:43 / 16.01.03

Ursula 1000.

The Return Of Rothkoid

11:01 / 16.01.03

Flux: no, I haven't read the book. Would like to, though. And more Shooby is always a good thing.

At the moment, Alice Coltrane is intriguing me. Got two albums of hers today, with Pharoah Sanders on horn - hot damn! It's good stuff; very much where The Necks are coming from, I think. And she plays a fucking HARP! How more rock could she get?

11:20 / 16.01.03

I'll probably be more through when I've had a bit of a longer think... but for some reason, Justin Timberlake's Cry Me A River is getting a very heavy workout on my WinAmp playlist. It's not a classic to last the test of time, or anything... but it's just so well constructed, compulsive. Got to be the Timbaland magic working again. It's all about the gaps, I tell you.

Old brown-eye is back

11:30 / 16.01.03

At this very moment I'm working my way through the shiny new DVD-A version of Automatic for the People. Had forgetten just to what degree its last three songs (Man on the Moon, Nightswimming, Find the River) are just about the best things ever recorded, ever. On Your Feet or On Your Knees by the fabulous Blue Oyster Cult kept me company on the way to work this morning, and that's grand too.

16:11 / 16.01.03

18 Shooby tracks here.

07:15 / 17.01.03

Hmm. I suppose the only new song that I've really dug is T.A.T.U's cover of 'How Soon Is Now' (MP3 available here), melding scrumptiously as it does my love of shiny pop music with my love of jingly-jangly indie music. In a rash moment I've splashed out £7.99 on their album at Play.com. I fear only disappointment awaits me, but.

23:24 / 17.01.03

A few different things here....

Turntablism - From Grandmaster Flash to Craze, and everything in between. I plan on skipping nothing in my search for the history of the dj.

70's Funk - Partly because of "Turntablism" above, and partly because I never really listened to this music before. Goddamn, I been missing out! (Incidentally does anyone have any good suggestions? I'm quite new to this funk thang...)

Rock bands who look backwards to go forwards - The Strokes, The Vines, QOTSA's new album, etc, etc, ad nauseum.

Swing and Big Band - Music for sundays.

Weird Techie Drum n Bass - Cos I love it!

My plan is to explore the Warp Records back catalogue, but its still a plan, and not in action yet.

Old brown-eye is back

00:24 / 18.01.03

Alex, make sure you've got your basic funky food groups covered. James Brown (and the JBs) and Sly and the Family Stone from the (late) sixties, Parliament/Funkadelic/Bootsy and Stevie Wonder from the seventies. Then Prince - lots and lots of Prince. Augment with selected recordings by The Meters, Graham Central Station, Lee Dorsey, The Isley Brothers and Curtis Mayfield. (There are loads of funk compilations around too - New Orleans Funk and Saturday Night Fish Fry on the wonderful Soul Jazz label being just about the best of them, in my experience.)

Thus will you free not only your mind, but also your ass.

Goodness Gracious Meme

01:35 / 18.01.03

post a really great nite club nite, I'm now about to obsess over Justin Timberlake, Soft Cell, Grandmaster Flahs (wasn't played but some contemp. stuff was), and seventies electrodisco. Yeah, again.

Also going through a bit of a hip-hop thing, with DJPremier/Timbaland being the two big hitters

Our Lady of The Two Towers

13:33 / 20.01.03

At the moment I've had a sudden rekindling of my love for Pulp, mainly by receiving the Hits CD for Christmas. This has inspired my own reevaluation of their 'This is Hardcore' album, till now I'd thought it an album of two halves, 'The Fear', 'Party Hard', 'Help the Aged', 'This is Hardcore' and 'Seductive Barry' being great, the rest being shit. But now I think it's all pretty good, the only duffer being 'Dishes', and 'A Little Soul' and 'I'm a Man' elevated to the pantheon of great Pulp songs.

As for 'Hits', as they don't have 'My legendary Girlfriend' on there I'm mainly listening to the last two tracks, the far too brief 'Sunrise' and the intriguing 'Last Day of the Miners' Strike' which for me sums up all that is great about Pulp, humour, bleakness, and Cocker's gift for a turn of phrase. Sometimes his lyrics fall a bit flat, but when he hits the target dead on, and the rest of the band find the exact right tune then it works more than it has the right to. 'Last Day...' is the great anthem we never had,
...And I said "Hey, lay your burden down,
seems the last day of the miners' strike was the Magna Carta in this part of town".

13:57 / 20.01.03

I plan on skipping nothing in my search for the history of the dj.

Start a thread!! And read "Rap Attack" by David Toop - the original Hip Hop book and probably still the best IMHO.

70's funk - don't know what to suggest to much around - I think there's alot of shite comps though, so best go with quality like Soul Jazz. Ultimate Breaks and Beats are wicked as well - and have all the original breaks as used endlessly by assorted Hip Hop bods on 'em.

The Natural Way

14:37 / 20.01.03

The new year brings new muce:

The Pixies - it's taken a while, but I've finally gotten around to 'Surfarosa', 'Come on Pilgrim' and 'Dolittle'. Superb and timeless.

Make Up - starting w/ 'Born on the Floor,' found my way to 'Sound Verite' and 'Save Yrself'. They have the punkfunk.

That LCD Soundsystem tune, 'Losing my Edge', is very good too, but I can't "get into it" properly because I haven't got a copy.

Byrne and Eno's 'My Life in the Bush of Ghosts' is just a lovely album as I've rediscovered. Yet again.

The Fall.

And the Rapture continue to sound nice to these ears.

Goodness Gracious Meme

14:51 / 20.01.03

The Rapture are indeed joyous.

*Rereads thread* Aren't we a bunch of hip and uptotheminute chaps?

On which note, I've been listening to AFX's Selected Ambient Works loads and loads and rediscovering how beatutiful they are...mmmmmmmm

Goodness Gracious Meme

14:55 / 20.01.03

Alex, re funk etc.... this whipped from something I posted on the UKGarage thread, a few songs, and names to be going on with...

James Brown, "Say it Loud...I'm Black and I'm Proud!", "Soul Power". "Ghetto Reality"
Marvin Gaye, "What's Goin On?", "Inner City Blues", "You're the Man"
Stevie Wonder, "Living for the City"
Sly and the Family Stone, "Don't Call Me Nigger, Whitey", ""
The Last Poets, "Niggers are Scared of Revolution"
Curtis Mayfield "Ghetto Child"
George Soule "Get Involved"

Regrettable Juvenilia

14:58 / 20.01.03

Watching 8 Mile has got me digging out all that classic mid-90s New York hip-hop: Mobb Deep, Wu-Tang, Biggie - also, repping LA, Xzibit back when he was good. Such a fertile period: it's all really grimy but consistently entertaining, sonically impressive... You ain't a crook son. You're just a shook one.

Also digging Patti Smith, see relevant thread.

And Kelly Osbourne's 'Shut Up' may be the second great single of 2003 (the first being 'Danger! High Voltage!', like you needed me to tell you that). Any song that contains both a bit that goes "blah blah, blah blah blah, blah blah" *and* a bit that goes "1-2-3-4!" cannot be beat. Plus, Kelly is another future ex-Mrs Flyboy. Don't hate.

Old brown-eye is back

15:19 / 20.01.03

Anyone feel like trying to decipher Flyboy's third para?

Plus, if any further funk recomendations are made without reference to George Clinton or Prince, I'm liable to get testy.

17:57 / 20.01.03

Agree that LCD soundsystem, The rapture, and Electric 6 are great! Also, check out Radio 4.

Matthew Fluxington

18:14 / 20.01.03

The past few days I've been listening to a lot of Zwan, but mostly obsessing on "Baby, Let's Rock!", which is just happy glam pop perfection, as far as I'm concerned.

uncle retrospective

19:48 / 20.01.03

Now we know who owns the "Billy Corgan" Fiction suit Flux.

Matthew Fluxington

19:59 / 20.01.03

That's an awful big assumption. I'm nothing like that guy at all!

21:45 / 20.01.03

I cannot believe Flyboy has mentioned "Danger High Voltage" and "Shut Up" in the same paragraph. Or sentence. Or thread. The former is brilliant, words do not describe the execrableness of the latter.

Currently doing my nut in, not in a good way: Tatu's cover of How Soon Is Now?. The greatest pop misunderstanding ever. Entirely dreadful. And yet I masochistically keep hitting "play". I might be dead by tomorrow if I keep this up.

Foust is SO authentic

00:30 / 21.01.03

The kind folks here at Barbelith have introduced me to the Flaming Lips.

The Beta Band's Three EPs is a staple for me these days. I don't think I'll ever get tired of Dry The Rain, Inner Meet Me or Needles In My Eye.

And Bruce Cockburn will continue to be a staple of mine for many years to come.

Regrettable Juvenilia

07:17 / 21.01.03

Some have claimed I do this on purpose, Paleface - not entirely true, but I did enjoy the juxtaposition of two songs I love, one of which is 'credible' and one which isn't. Mind you, if you don't like t.A.t.u (or however you write it) *either*, I suspect there must be - yes! - Something Wrong With You...

The Natural Way

07:47 / 21.01.03

There's definitely something wrong with me, then.

Hattie's Kitchen

10:43 / 21.01.03

Oh how I loathe myself, but I can't stop playing that Tatu "How Soon Is Now" cover...how can I love and hate something so much at the same time...also digging Natacha Atlas and Mahalia Jackson at the moment, so not all hope is lost.

10:56 / 21.01.03

I have been playing Johnny Too Bad by The Slickers over and over and over. Does anyone know where I can find MP3s of some more Slickers stuff?

12:07 / 21.01.03

I just got 'round to buying the Rough Trade Shops Rock N' Roll compilation, and while I don't really want to buy into the whole NME sponsored nu-r'n'r thing, and don't entirely approve of dubious compilations collecting some of the more obvious examples of a currently fashionable genre..

..only a fool would deny that the sheer damn fine shit factor of the whole thing complete supercedes any such petty concerns..

Not a bad track in the whole 2 and a half hours (except possibly the Hives - not that I have anything against them - who sound pretty laughable in comparison to the breakneck feedback-filled derangement of most of the other tracks..)

And god bless them for selecting fine Stooges and MC5 tracks that I've never heard before!

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