Log #200 - Keep On Trekking For The People

It took 200 blog posts to reach REM. I think they were the sort of band that suffered a bit from over familiarity, like U2 or Coldplay. They were also, allegedly, quite middle of the road and mainstream, certainly in their mid to latter period. I don't know much about them to be fair but know they hit the mainstream big around the time of this album (their 8th released in 1992), and the predecessor ...

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Log #199 - Discovering Daft Punk

  Matthew E White - Fresh Blood War On Drugs - Slave Ambient Cocteau Twins - Heaven Or Las Vegas Alva Noto - Unieqav Daft Punk - Discovery Fennesz - VeniceI discovered Daft Punk through the animated film Interstellar 5555. The film tells the story of a band who are kidnapped by an evil dictator who wants to rule the world, or something. ...

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Log #180 - Adding The Mix To The Kraftwerk Mix

Kraftwerk - The Mix Brian Eno - Apollo Midlake - The Trials Of Van Occupanther Cluster - Zuckerzeit JJ Cale - Naturally Cocteau Twins - Four-Calendar Cafe The Mix was a double album of Kraftwerk remixes and re-recordings of previous material released in 1991. The band had recently returned to live touring after a 9 year hiatus and ...

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Log #179 - What Next? Heaven Or Las Vegas

Another clean sweep of the magazine this week: everybody out, new lot in please (often precipitated by a visit of friends over the weekend). Next is many fans' favourite Alex Harvey (SAHB) album. I have it at no. 3 in my personal rundown. Next from 1973 was Harvey's second album with the Sensational Band although he'd made solo albums before teaming up with the former Tear Gas band ...

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Log #86 - The Incredible Incredible String Band

Got a real "marmite" record in the player this week. The incredible Incredible String Band record is frankly amazing. It's just very different. It's fairly indescribable. The closest description would be a sort of folk, sometimes termed psychedelic folk: In their amateurish mish-mash of world music styles, epic poetic traditions and copious psychedelics they stumbled upon a style of music ...

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Log #85 - Is This Neil Young's Greatest Ever Album?

Is On The Beach Neil Young's greatest ever album? The middle of the so called "ditch" trilogy, On the Beach came out in 1974 between 1973's Time Fades Away and 1975's Tonight's The Night. ~ 1. Neil Young - On The Beach 2. Deep Purple - Machine Head 3. Cocteau Twins - Four Calendar Cafe 4. Cocteau Twins - Treasure 5. Susuma Yokota - Sakura 6. Ludovico ...

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Log #84 - Heaven or 'El(p)

Pure Class Continuing an eclectic mix of music this week we have dance, blues, world, and prog. Record of the week comes in the shapely form of the Cocteau Twins. Many fans standby their early indie music as their best although I prefer the latter period albums, this one Heaven or Las Vegas, or Four Calendar Cafe. They were very much of their time and were mainstays of the excellent ...

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Log #14 - David Bowie's Black Star a Year On

2016 began with the death of David Bowie in January and then continued with Prince and Leonard Cohen. The end of the year brought more musician deaths with the premature passing of George Michael and Rick Parfitt. These were the most famous names but of course there were other less mainstream losses in the music world which registered less comment, for example both Greg Lake and Keith Emerson from ...

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Log #13 - A Calexico Retrospective and a Nod to a Brilliant Music Discovery App

Tucson Roots and Americana band Calexico come out of the blue to dominate this week's listening (and a plug for the brilliant gnod music discovery website). An unplanned £1 charity shop purchase of the cover album (Garden Ruin) encouraged a retrospective taking in the celebrated Black Light, Feast of Wire, and Hot Rail albums. Garden Ruin is more mainstream than these earlier albums, sounding ...

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Log #12 - New Treasure Uncovered

Several times in my music listening life I've heard something for the first time which sounded like nothing else I had ever heard before. This happened with Can, Neil Young, David Sylvian, Stereolab, and Boards of Canada. I also remember getting a lift back from the North of England in a friend's car one evening and once again hearing something that sounded so different and original to my ears. ...

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