Posts by Ken Double
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Lorde is indeed a piece of work. On her Reddit the other day she said "I can sit down with basically the most intimidating people in the industry and not flinch." Peter Jackson has cojones like that. It's as important as her obvious talent.
That said, on a personal level I admire Pure Heroine more than love it. I like her intelligence and love the way her hooks rise up unexpectedly, but until she's got drunk, got laid and fucked up like the rest of us she's not really talking to the likes of me. Not in the way that, say, Robyn does. It's why I can't get with her cover of "Swinging Party", one of my favourite songs by my favourite band. I look forward to her maturity though.
I love a list, but there's too many of them, so I'd just urge the sympathetic to go out and buy two records from a genre no one ever talks about - modern country music. They would be Kacey Musgraves' "Same Trailer, Different Park" and Ashley Monroe's "Like a Rose". Clever, literate women with (particularly in Monroe's case) fantastic voices. After all the moody, ethereal, atmospheric crap ProTools inflicts on the world, the clarity and emotional detail is utterly refreshing.
Thanks for all the musical heads ups Russell. Really looking forward to hearing the Trick Mammoth album - I first found them when you posted the demos here a while back.
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But don't listen to me - go there
Oh brave new world that has such gadgets in it.
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Saw old Daddypants in Melbourne and was seriously hoping he'd play "Just Like Fire Would". He did not oblige, so I'm grateful to see that.
And I do like to see a Roland JC120 in its native habitat. You guys must have been popular with the neighbours. Those things are loud.
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Hard News: Friday Music: Little, but…, in reply to Ian Dalziel,
Dr ‘Huckster’ Bill, I presume?
Oh yeah. Right up there with Dave Allen.
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Hard News: Friday Music: Little, but…, in reply to Stephen D. O'Hoy,
Bill Cosby!!!!!!
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I'm OK with the bedroom boom, but I gotta say there's nothing better for kicking the bullshit and solipsism out of some over-sensitive young person than robust interaction with a band. Rhythm sections have a limited tolerance for "ethereal" and "atmospheric", as do most audiences.
Just on the general FYI front, Estere's a good mate of my niece and a lovely girl, but she hasn't been 17 in about 5 years.
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Hard News: Friday Music: I like your old…, in reply to Jason Kemp,
Christgau actually wrote his own farewell to Lou in Spin.
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Every time Paul McCartney puts out a new album – which is surprisingly often – some of my dearest friends will gamely insist that Maccas’s back on form. He’s not. It’s just another lot of annoying sing-song melodies.
Thank God, yes. I believe Paulie's technocratic tinkering has finally found its natural audience - indie. They all worship "Ram" like it was the Golden Calf rather than a pleasant if occasionally annoying collection of ditties, so whatever he puts out now is deemed to be evidence of genius rather than facility. The old bugger does deserve a break after the boomers have (rightly) lionised his buddy for four decades, but honestly....
Du Fresne's slag of the Velvets was flat out hilarious. The work of an unreconstructed coot. He proves my assertion that to understand the VU is to understand the nature of rock itself. I'm not sure even Chuck Berry himself wrote a song about rock and roll as good as "Rock & Roll".
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Speaker: Ed Kuepper: a legend interviewed, in reply to Ian Dalziel,
apart from a hapless roadie diligently doing the dishes beyond the witching hour
Somehow I can picture that scene perfectly Mr Dalziel.
I loved Ed. That beautifully processed acoustic guitar made him sound like a one man orchestra. Must admit I was hoping for "Black Ticket Day" but what the hell. Perhaps when he comes back.....
Television were indeed a little soft focus. Verlaine seems to have lost interest in singing and made little effort to project those epic songs in a way that might have galvanised his great band. Such shyness and diffidence. And I say this as a paid up, evangelical, avoid-me-at-parties Television bore.
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Also: you got a problem with Abba, buddy?
I do admire them in the way that one tends to admire ruthlessly efficient killing machines. Personally, gimme The Shirelles any day.