Hard News by Russell Brown

Looks like Ms Barnett has worked out that irony doesn't have to mean detachment. She sounds almost pissed off. And her band sounds pissed off too. Cool!

Looks like Ms Barnett has worked out that irony doesn’t have to mean detachment. She sounds almost pissed off. And her band sounds pissed off too. Cool!

She sounded really pissed off when they played that one at Laneway.

I can attest to Robin Lambert's skill as a salesman in Sounds Unlimited - I would walk in, he'd recognise me, suggest 2 or 3 new arrivals to listen to, and I would inevitably leave with what I'd been intending to buy AND the 2 or 3 he'd played for me. I was only ever a weekly visitor, but he still knew who I was when I went in there - it was almost like having your own personal record buyer.

nice link to Kris - he does the Lord's work, no pun etc.

I'd like to give a shout out for Colin at Revival Records in Victoria Street. Passed many an hour there after uni in the '80s before getting a bus back to the cultural wasteland of the North Shore. A lovely bloke who kept a small selection of rarities under the counter for the regulars...

The article says late 80's but it must have been open in 1980 as I was living at home in first year of uni.

the Vinyl Countdown...

Auckland Record Shops

I can remember trundling round many of these on a monthly basis dropping off Rip It Ups - after spending the preceding week chasing some of them for ad copy, Robin Lambert was usually last and usually complicated with dense type, then I'd to finally have to go through and cross out the full price on all the import bargains with letraset lines - fiddly and irksome late at night - but now I can look back and laugh - ha ha ha... oh the Eighties.... - I still miss that battered tofu dish from Dominos, though - I've never found its equal again...

I noticed this a bit late for the blog, but this story of the pursuit of Billie Holiday, adapted from Johann Hari’s book Chasing The Scream: The First and Last Days of the War on Drugs , is a shocking and still relevant read. I will have to find this book.

" mongrel music made up of European, Caribbean and African echoes, all mating on American shores."
Sounds like musical heaven to me, but Gunslinger sez it was "musical anarchy and evidence of a recurrence of the primitive impulses"
Looks like a good read, if depressing in a wider sense.
How much longer will the suited lunatics run the asylum. Until its a burned out shell? and a wealthy few sit in gated comfort.
Won't matter then will it!

Should be easy enough to track down. I had a quick check and Chc Library has 4 copies - all being read btw.

Shocking stuff and I was reminded of Strange Fruit and dug around a little and found some articles. This one Strange Fruit is still a song for today references of course the poem (by Abel Meeropol) turned into the famous song. Here's an extract from that:

The horrible truth is that in parts of the south in the early 20th century, the hanging of black people in public was a family occasion; lynching was part of the social fabric.

Family occasion!? Not too dissimilar really from the 'thrill' the public attending public executions which are taking place, both illegally (ie lynching) and state-sanctioned, in certain parts of the world currently. And in similar vein, there's this extract in Strange Fruit: the first great protest song from Dorian Lynskey, his book 33 Revolutions Per Minute, his history of protest songs,

...she begins her final number.

"Southern trees bear a strange fruit." This, you think, isn't your usual lovey-dovey stuff. "Blood on the leaves and blood at the root." What is this? "Black bodies swinging in the Southern breeze." Lynching? It's a song about lynching? The chatter from the tables dries up. Every eye in the room is on the singer, every ear on the song. After the last word – a long, abruptly severed cry of "crop" – the whole room snaps to black. When the house lights go up, she's gone.

Another book I must seek out.

Here's a live b/w recording of Strange Fruit

Should be easy enough to track down. I had a quick check and Chc Library has 4 copies – all being read btw

Reading it on my iPad already :-)

Love the Aretha. One of my favourite tracks of hers, and that's a great remix.

Press One for Accounts...

If you're thinking of using Neil Finn's music as your company's hold tune, think again.
The Kiwi recording artist this morning tweeted his disdain for such use of his songs: "I'm ready to fight against the use of my songs for customer service hold music."

I'm guessing Neil Finn phoned vodafone,
I wonder if Bic Runga has lately?

I often wonder who compiles the sounds for the Stanmore Rd New World in Chchch it doesn't sound like a muzak package, more like an ipod playlist...

Searching for the god particle...
...while you are in Stanmore Road there is a neat exhibition at the Linwood Community Arts Centre's Eastside Gallery (cnr Worcester St).
works by Michael Springer
...some pieces are painted on slate from St Lukes church roof
i got triggers of messrs H. Bosch and H.P. Lovecraft,
frissons even...

Hari was just interviewed on John Safran’s first 2015 Sunday night show on Triple J, on his new book.

http://www.abc.net.au/triplej/safran/