look up…

I was stood outside and saw this.

It’s that time of year things are running down and the sky gets more interesting.

I was moved to play this.

I think they have a certain atmosphere in common.

oooh I’m in heaven again…

There’s such a sense of satisfaction knowing Ritchie Blackmore played with Deep Purple again. There’s something organic about the MKII lineup and the way they all played together. I know it’s considered heavy rock/metal by some but it’s just great loud all hands to the pump fuck you head down and go for it rock and roll. Yes there’s a regret it didn’t happen when John Lord was alive but at least it happened. There a few other rock feuds would be good to see end or at least acknowledge that it can all be put aside for ten minutes.

Tonight I played this again and reminded myself what was so great about Purple in their prime. Yes the songs may last a week, there’s a certain pretentiousness around the call and response vocal guitar player thing at times. At no point in any song does it get boring and there’s always Paice holding the beat like the god of rock and roll he is.

So tonight I can sleep well knowing that some people can get over themselves and admit that that thing they had with their friends was special and should be celebrated.

I also defy anyone to find a finer song in the world than Lazy and Lords neo-classical phantom of the opera heading towards feedback intro is a thing of sheer beauty. The rest of the band also manage to take it over the top.

no ear fingers…

I’ve been really enjoying instrumental music recently, the slower and more reflective the better. Spafford Campbell fit the bill tonight. It’s allegedly folk, I guess there are fiddles and guitars and is that a banjo somewhere around all this?

Yes I know there are occasional vocals but I’m damned if I know what they’re singing about.

It’s folk music for a collapsing society, it has more in common with Godspeed You! Black Emperor than the Clancy’s. It’s drones and discord and melody and it needs to be played at volume.

There are definitely no fingers discernibly in ear here.

screaming souls in the night…

Of all the albums I have managed to acquire over the years there are a few that just demand attention from beginning to end and once you begin you’re in for the whole journey.

Hawkwind’s X In Search of Space. is one. It may even be my favorite Hawkwind album. Yes there’s no Lemmy but there is the space rock motorik beats and the electronics screech and scream and warble like lost souls in the night.

Shouldn’t Do That may be the greatest statement for the huddled masses ever written, a mesmeric space chant for the disenfranchised. A song for a society collapsing under authoritarian fear mongers a dystopian anthem for today, a timeless howl against the man, or just a great tune to get altered and sway. You chose. Or maybe it’s all real man.

What we need right now is to be saved by The Master of the Universe. It’s an incredibly coherent album from Hawkwind. Themes of collapse and decline throughout ending with what could be seen as hippy anthem but is closer to a disturbing Quatermass vision of the disenfranchised youth rebelling in the ruins.

It’s not a happy hippy album. It’s a stark meandering, disturbing stroll through the decline. Hypnotic, insistent and sounding as relevant today as in 1971. and it’s going to mess you up some days man.

“ a distorted version of the original experience…”

I’ve been writing this long post since I got back from England and visiting my mum. Maybe it covers too much ground.

I’ve also been listening to Elori Saxl’s The Blue of Distance. A truly stunning and beautiful collection of found sounds, analogue synths and chamber orchestra. A reflective piece, reflective looking back from the isolated dead of winter to a happy summer.

I think it’s one of the most beautiful rewarding listening experiences I’ve had in a long time.

I moved taking the picture, I like it.

Here’s a better shit picture.

Maybe that long post will materialize at some point or maybe it’ll just be a reflective exercise for myself.

What I do know is it’s time to make an effort to get back to this, whatever it is.

Found in the woods.

when you go down you take me down with you…

Several weeks have been in this weird shifting and morphing phase. A sense of disjointedness and dissatisfaction, restless and yet slothful, a malignant malaise.

I walked onto the beach the other weekend, walked a mile along the coastline, the view in front of me was glorious, the blue that you can only get at the coast in the sky and soft floaty clouds, as I reached the point where I could no longer walk, faced by jagged cliffs and rocks as the the tide came in I turned to return. The sky I turned to was a malevolent charcoal, roiling with movement and the threat of hail. I headed into the darkness, leaning into the rising wind as large raindrops started to fall pounding my head. I regretted the lack of rain gear as the rate of fall increased and I had a mile of this to go. Arriving eventually at the house drenched and freezing, I wrapped myself in a blanket huddled next to the fire place, feeling warmth finally.

This is indicative of how the last few weeks has been, the way ahead looks clear and behind is the storm waiting to overwhelm me, cold and impersonal.

So the light hearted stroll in the sun has been Snocaps, Katie and Alison Crutchfield’s exercise in indie pop fun. The lyric can be heavy but the sound is pure pop.

Guitars bass and drums rocking along at a sunny clip disguising the seriousness of the songs. Songs of lost love, addiction and the realities of life surrounded by jangle pop guitars and off kilter drumming.

The other side of the stroll phase been Elori Saxl, I’m not sure if it’s a avant garde classical composing, ambient synth or some form of jazz that includes analogue synth. It’s textured, intense, beautiful at times mixing ambient sounds of a lake and sax solos, hard to explain. It does however leave you drenched and exhausted and uplifted at the end, introspective music for troubling times.

meet me in the bottle…

It’s hard to pinpoint exactly when I got the blues. There is however a clear memory of when the blues got me.

We were lounging on a hot summer afternoon in Sefton Park in the golden time between the afternoon closing of the pubs and the reopening for the evening.

Dave had brought a shitty old mono cassette player and a cassette of Hooker and Heat. We probably dozed through much of it allowing the hypnotic rhythm to ooze into our pores.

Towards the end of side 4 Andy stood up raised his arms to the air and loudly declared “we are the boogie chillen…” At this point the love of the blues was instilled in the gathered crowd.

There was then much cavorting and dancing in the park as parents sheltered their children from this strange sight on a Saturday afternoon.

you know, I can’t win, now people, ‘Cause i don’t have a thing to lose…

Plenty of people played jails in the 60s and 70s it was kind of a thing. When BB King played Cool County Jail it changed him. He went on to play over 50 jails in his life, set up an organization to help inmates and continued to advocate for human rights in jail.

Many claim Live at the Regal to be the best live blues album, Cook County Jail however may beat it. The soul, passion, solidarity with the audience and the empathy ofBB Kings playing make this album a strong contender. Some complain of the passivity of the audience, for gods sake these are men in jail told to behave, the attention to the music however is palpable.

We all need a little more empathy and these days and maybe B.B. can help.

I found this album awhile ago, the cover looks like it was in a flood, he vinyl was so dirty I doubted it would clean up and there are some scratches that looked deep. However after a cleaning it plays really nicely. I guess this was destined to raise my mood today.

The cover is still suspect.

she got everything…

Slowhand, nickname, job description, album title.

Back in the day, this album would get played late at night and repeatedly. At the time we were all enamored with the world weary sound, the melancholy and the vibe. I’m not sure if we thought this was the Blues, it did however fit up there with some idea of blues.

Later on Dave would show up with Donny Terry and Brownie MacGee and then we knew the blues. Then we heard JJ Cale and a John Martyn and figured out the truth. I’m still not sure how to file this. It’s a groove I suppose. Clapton at his laid back best singing about adult subjects and sometimes it made us feel all grown up.

ain’t got no drivin’ wheels…

I’ve been finding solace in the blues.

This all began at the end of February when a John Hammond died. I started playing the albums I owned by him again and discovered a rich wealth of material. Especially the album Footwork which sometime in the 80’s became the gateway album to Mose Allison, Robert Johnson and Blind Willie McTell.

This evening as I avoided watching the world descend into a maelstrom of poor decisions and flatulent excuses Footwork was a solace.

There’s something wonderful about acoustic blues. It’s everything broke down to voice guitar and harp. It’s visceral and passionate and the sound of tragedy, lust and loss, joy and despair and real people’s emotions.

As things become less real in the world it’s important to hold on to what’s solid and tangible and real. Oftentimes it’s found in the simple and the sincere, which is usually the music of the people.