150th Retrospective Episode

Happy 150th!

I thought it would be nice to have a miniature restrospective on the occasion of our 150th episode. So, what I did was carve the episode list into tranches of ten and then choose a vaguely representative song from each.

Camera Obscura gets us under way representing the rise of female bands and Scotland and uplifting melancholia, a hallmark of the programme.

Next, the late great Mark E Smith of The Fall, the most played artist on the programme.

Then a nod to our theme tune by Broken Social Scene, with another track from their classic album ‘You Forgot It In People’.

Covid hit next and so we have a track from the Gang of Four, partially because Andy Gill may have been Patient Zero for the pandemic in the UK, but also, an appropriate track about losing your job.

NZs Tiny Ruins gave us a mini-masterpiece, ‘Me at the Museum’ being a track I always associate with lockdown walks.

Three songs strong on humour next, as an antidote (not literally, unfortunately) to the pandemic with Jonathan Coulton, Dry Cleaning and Half Man Half Biscuit. We do not fear funny.

Dub reggae has frequently featured as well, and it felt important to have a Lee Scratch Perry track walk amongst us.

The podcast received a major boost from Adam Buxton when he recommended us; one song he called out was ‘Paper House’ by The Associates, so here that is again.

It was great to get to see two bands that have always meant a lot to me, Pavement and The Strokes with two of my children recently, and the song ‘Ode to the Mets’ clearly meant a lot to Luke Finley too because, like Kylie, he couldn’t get it out of his head.

Another of the many great new female bands around is Horsegirl and we play them a lot. And now we’re playing them again.

Television remind me of my time back in the UK last year catching up with my TV-head friend, Nigel.

And I thought it would be nice to finish with a band I’ve only just discovered, who split up ten years ago, Standard Fare. Because that’s what the podcast is meant to do.

Here’s to the next 150. 

Setlist:

Eighties fan, Camera Obscura

Dr Buck’s letter, The Fall

Anthem for a seventeen-year-old girl, Broken Social Scene

Paralysed, The Gang of Four

Me in the museum, you in the Winter Gardens, Tiny Ruins

Shop vac, Jonathan Coulton

Scratchcard lanyard, Dry Cleaning

Knobheads on quiz shows, Half Man Half Biscuit

Here come the warm dreads, Lee Scratch Perry (feat Brian Eno)

Paper house, The Associates

In the mouth a desert, Pavement

Ode to the Mets, The Strokes

History lesson (Part 2), Horsegirl

Days, Television

Love doesn’t just stop, Standard Fare

Episode 149 - Music about music

Here are the lyrics to two iconic tracks about music itself from my ‘70s youth.

First, a track simply called “Music” by John Miles.

Music was my first love
And it will be my last
Music of the future
And music of the past

To live without my music
Would be impossible to do
In this world of troubles
My music pulls me through

To live without my music
Would be impossible to do
'Cause in this world of troubles
My music pulls me through

Beautiful sentiments, John, thank you very much. Classic on-hit wonder stuff, of course, but I do hope the royalties continue to flow in.

Even better, here’s Australian singer Kevin Johnson with “Rock and roll, I gave you all the best years of my life”:

I can still remember when I bought my first guitar
Remember just how good the feeling was, put it proudly in my car
And my family listened 50 times to my two song repertoire
And I told my mum her only son was gonna be a sta

Bought all the Beatle records, sounded just like Paul
Bought all the old Chuck Berry's, 78's and all
And I sat by my record player, playin' every note they played
And I watched them all on TV, makin' every move they made

Rock and roll, I gave you all the best years of my life
All the dreamy sunny Sundays, all the moon-lit summer nights
I was so busy in the back room writin' love songs to you
While you were changin' your direction and you never even knew
That I was always, just one step behind you

‘66 seemed like the year I was really goin' somewhere
We were living in San Francisco, with flowers in our hair
Singing songs of kindness, so the world would understand
But the guys and me were something more than just another band

 And then '69 in LA, came around so soon
We were really making headway and writing lots of tunes
And we must have played the wildest stuff we had ever played
The way the crowds cried out for us, we thought we had it made

Rock and roll, I gave you all the best years of my life
All the crazy lazy young days, all the magic moon-lit nights
I was so busy on the road singin' love songs to you
While you were changin' your direction, and you never even knew
That I was always, just one step behind you

'71 in Soho, when I saw Suzanne
I was trying to go it solo, with someone else's band
And she came up to me later and I took her by the hand
And I told her all my troubles and she seemed to understand

And she followed me through London, through a hundred hotel rooms
Through a hundred record companies who didn't like my tunes
And she followed me when, finally, I sold my old guitar
And she tried to help me understand, I'd never be a star

Rock and roll, I gave you all the best years of my life
All the dreamy sunny Sundays, all the moon-lit summer nights
And though I never knew the magic of makin' it with you
Thank the Lord for giving me the little bit I knew
And I will always be one step behind you

Rock and roll, I gave you all the best years of my life
Singing out my love songs in the brightly flashing lights
And though I never knew the magic of makin' it with you
I thank the Lord for giving me the little bit I knew

Lovely stuff. Would have been nice to hear a little more of Suzanne’s backstory, but different times. Well, neither of those tracks appear on this episode, being in the nature of non-alternative guilty pleasures. But here’s what you have got to look forward to:

Setlist:

IPC sub-editors dictate our youth, Clinic

Let’s dance (Yak inek unuk), Ibibio Sound Machine

Groove is in the hearts/California Girls, Crocodiles

All the records on the radio are shite, Ballboy

Johnny Cash, Sons and Daughters

Ballroom dance scene, Horsegirl

Dancing, Standard Fare

Keep dubbing, King Tubby

Indies of the world, Swansea Sound

Blue light disco, Mr Teenage

Perfect popsong, All Ashore!

The singer, Caroline Martin

Punk rock, Mogwai

Transmission, Joy Division

Episode 148 - Those We Lost in 2023

I was saying to a friend around Christmastime that I didn’t think there’d been as many musical casualties as usual this year. But then you add it up and the list is as long as ever.

I was reading an Agatha Christie to relax on holiday and the prosecuting barrister in the murder trial rounded on a witness: she was Irish, was she not? - and therefore not to be trusted. The Irish, he explained to the court, were notorious story embroiders. (Different times). Well, that was Shane McGowan and it was also Sinead O’Connor – wonderful, beguiling musical story embroiderers.

Tom Verlaine is one of my all-time musical heroes. In one of the musical online mags I noted that ‘Marquee Moon’ was recently voted best album of the ‘70s. The hyperbole of Nick Kent’s double page 1977 review in the NME doesn’t seem so over the top now. What a band, what a musician.

Another musical hero was the rather lesser sung Alan Rankine of The Associates. I remember seeing the band very early on and naturally my eye was drawn to the theatrics and operatic octave-swooping of Billy MacKenzie. The musical genius behind it all I cannot now picture, which is a great shame. And let us not forget his seminal role in bringing Belle and Sebastian to our attention also.

The Pop Group lost both Gareth Stewart and John Waddington in 2023. Though little known in the broader world, they were one of those groups whom artists such as Nick Cave regularly mention as being game changers.

Bass players Andy Rourke of The Smiths and Steve Mackey of Pulp were also relatively unsung, but one listen to Rusholme Ruffians will certainly correct the presumption that The Smiths were a two-man group. Similarly, drummer and producer Gary West of Pavement had his part to play in the early evolution of the group, while Geordie Walker of Killing Joke was the guitarist in that generation-straddling outfit, doing much to establish their distinctive sound.

Ryuichi Sakomoto had a long lasting influence both solo and as a member of Yellow Magic Orchestra, while David Crosby excelled in both CSNY and The Byrds. And while we’re at it, here’s to Burt Bacharach and, hell, why not, Seymour Stein too.

RIP to all our wonderful music makers and catalysts.

Setlist:

A rainy night in Soho, The Pogues

Friction, Television

Tell me Easter’s on Friday, The Associates

She is beyond good and evil, The Pop Group

Joyriders, Pulp

Rusholme ruffians, The Smiths

Perfume-V, Pavement

I just don’t know what to do with myself, The White Stripes

All I wish, The Byrds

All apologies, Sinead O’Connor

Requiem, Killing Joke

Merry Christmas Mr Lawrence, Ryuichi Sakomoto

Seymour Stein, Belle and Sebastian

Episode 147 - Festive Forthy 2023, #14-1

As I mentioned on the podcast, it’s good to be celebratory at Christmas. Eat too much pavlova, reflect on the year that’s been, watch ‘Love, Actually’ again. Actually actually, I prefer ‘Brief Encounter’ and too much stuffing, but, hey, we’ve all got our rituals.

If I were to notice a trend in the upper regions of this year’s chart though, there’s maybe a little more melancholia around.

When two-fold silence was the song of love

When life lived in dreams and time fell like rain

When all the summer flowers were for you and me

When life tasted sweet and fate was a friend

When all of my secrets were yours to keep

Stuck inside your beauty, falling in too deep

When gentle magic took me by surprise

When we felt everything standing side by side

(This world couldn’t see us, Nabibah Iqbal)

And it’s not just the personal melancholy concerning the relationships that didn’t work out either (the abiding staple of popular music, after all).

There’s a very poignant moment in the film ‘A Private Function’, set in the immediate aftermath of the Second World War, when a character opines “I miss the war”. Sometimes I too miss our war, AKA Covid lockdowns. As we’ve all got back into a working rhythm big style post-Covid, many of the stresses of 21st century living have also re-emerged. And rather than brushing them under the carpet, some of the songs here dwell on the uncertainties and imperfections of post-lockdown living.

I was particularly struck by the lyrics to our number one song:

Taking it easy is a full time job

One I'm tired of

Doing my best is a full time job

But it doesn't pay the rent

Never wanted to be someone's wife

Give up my whole life

So I try to be brave in the crowd

But I'm on my knees now

(Full Time Job, Squirrel Flower)

But let’s not leave it there. It’s Christmas. I was also struck by this lyric reminding us that everyday there are small, happy moments to be grateful for. That, in the end, is what life is, I suppose.

I like sleepin' with the lights on

You next to me watching Formula One

(Formula One, Wednesday)

Happy Christmas, everyone.

Tracklist:

14. Touchdown, NNAMDI

13. Pinking shears, Mandy, Indiana

12. World’s greatest emoter, bar italia

11. Eraser, Sweeping Promises

10. Alarm, Lifeguard

9. Paris, Texas, Lana Del Rey (feat. SYML)

8. Tastes just like it costs (live), M J Lenderman

7. This world couldn’t see us, Nabihah Iqbal

6. Calcified time, Glittering Insects

5. All my thoughts, Free Range

4. Limited edition, Cusp

3. Formula One, Wednesday

2. no fun/party, Kara Jackson

1. Full time job, Squirrel Flower

Episode 146 - Festive Forthy 2023, #27-15

There is a well-worn phrase used in describing a certain passage of play in a cricket One Day International: the boring middle overs. Also, there’s a witticism about how novels work: the start, the end and the muddle. I sincerely hope the same could not be applied to the central reaches of this year’s Festive Forthy.

In fact, there’s plenty of new acts to get one’s teeth into, rounded out by a couple of stalwarts in Sparks with their idiosyncratic portrayal of a 1-day old child petitioning to return to his mother’s womb, and Beach House with their trademark languorous shoegaze drone.

Elsewhere there’s classic post-punk from Wombo, Daughter and Cola, while Grian Chatten breaks free from his parent post-punk group; chilled-out dance music from Yune Pinku; a blast of psychedelia from Duster; Broadcast-style electronica from the excellent Vanishing Twin; beautiful moments of reflection from Winter and Jana Horn; and elsewhere intriguing innovative moves from Models/Actriz and Water From Your Eyes.  

Boring middle overs! What can possibly top this, more like. Well, presumably the 14 tracks which will become available in a week’s time.

Tracklist:

27. Nothing is as good as they say it is, Sparks

26. Slab, Wombo

25, Fairlies, Grian Chatten

24. The Weed Supreme, Duster

23. Crossing Guard, Models/Actriz

22. Sunday, Winter

21. Party, Daughter

20. Barley, Water From Your Eyes

19. Afternoon X, Vanishing Twin

18. Sports, Yune Pinku

17. Days go by, Jana Horn

16. At pace, Cola

15. Devil’s pool, Beach House

Episode 145 - Festive Forthy 2023, #40-28

There’s a groundswell of commentary that this is one of the best years ever for music. My mind always returns to what an old friend of mine said 40 years ago. Every year’s the best year for music because this is the only year in which we have all the music of the past plus this year’s music. Deep stuff.

I’m not convinced this is the best year for music, even accepting the above definition. I think there’s more of it and what I’ve assembled for this year’s Festive Forthy is of excellent quality.

But two thoughts. Is there a truly exceptional emerging artist? Actually I think there are two or three at the top end of the charts, so yes to that. But then also, are there new developments we’re seeing, new robust microgenres emerging, for example. I’m not so sure.

I will say though that one of the discoveries of the year for me was Chicago as a scene I was previously unaware of. Expect to see Chicago bands throughout - this episode has Deeper at #38. Also, happy to dot around the world - this episode sees Reykjavik represented by JFDR, Japan with Deerhoof and, most likely a first, Zambia with Witch.

Plus – macro point – every year these charts become more and more overwhelming to compile. On and off for the last couple of months, then more intensely over the last couple of weeks, I’ve been endlessly refining this list. Well, not quite endlessly, because, after all, here we are, but you get the drift.

By way of reference here are some – certainly not all - of the artists who we’ve played before on the show, made the longlist, got very close, but ultimately didn’t quite make it: Jockstrap, Black Country New Road, Protomartyr, Let’s Eat Grandma, Sufjan Stevens, Guided by Voices, Phoebe Bridgers, The Murder Capital, The Clientele, Bonnie Prince Billy, Blur, bdrmm, Beach Fossils, Squid, Slowdive, Tim Hecker, Sparklehorse, Beirut, Occult X, Frankie Cosmos, Bartees Strange, The National, The Beths and Automatic.

There’s another list which I’ll share with you in a couple of weeks of new artists who didn’t quite make it – and would make a splendid “Shadow” Festive Forthy. Next time, perhaps. Meanwhile …

Setlist:

40. Bringer of brine, Jellyskin

39. Pod, Snooper

38. Build a bridge, Deeper

37. The orchid, JFDR

36. Waile, Witch

35. Consequences, Kate Davis

34. I thought you’d change, Hotline TNT

33. Painted the room, Rozi Plain

32. Tarantula, Drop Nineteens

31. My lovely cat! Deerhoof

30. Slugs, Slow Pulp

29. I am the river, Lael Neale

28. Fallout, Yo La Tengo

Episode 144 - Neutral Milk Hotel, 25 years later

Like a lot of people, I was slow to get into In The Aeroplane, Over The Sea, Neutral Milk Hotel’s second album which was released 25 years ago. It follows on from some early songs and than an initial album from 1996 called On Avery Island. I can’t quite remember now exactly when it did sneak up on me. I do remember driving one Saturday morning from Burwood to Ashburton on the way to pick the kids up from a football match (the days before I coached them) and becoming entranced by Two-Headed Boy. And on the freeway when Holland, 1945 came up on a mixtape and experiencing that visceral thrill.

Jeff Mangum said that before he recorded these songs, he was frequently visited by uneasy dreams of a Jewish family from the Second World War. Rather like Quentin Tarantino in Once Upon A Time In Hollywood and Inglorious Basterds, the album is partially an exercise in yearning nostalgia for a past that never happened.

But there does seem to be more happening than an Anne Frank concept album. It is impressionistic and not easily grasped, like the best poetry. There is plenty of sexual imagery, but it is certainly not a sexy album. Nor is it opportunistic. There’s a lot about parents as well. And carnival grotesqueness. If David Lynch had taken a different path and formed a group, the output would, you sense, be something much like this. It doesn’t easily admit of rational explanation, which makes it exasperating, exhilarating and sometimes desperately melancholy. And truly amazing.

A little like Closer by Joy Division and Spiderland by Slint, for NMH there was really nowhere left to go when they’d recorded these albums. So, unfortunately for us, they just kinda stopped, for ever on the brink. Two of the singers had some sort of a breakdown and the other one committed suicide. Obviously we would sacrifice these albums in a heartbeat if we could repair the mental damage. But that isn’t a deal that the universe is terribly interested in. What we do know is that those three albums are utterly authentic.

I was fortunate enough to actually witness these songs performed live in Melbourne about twelve years ago. The band seemed relaxed, almost joyous and it was a cathartic experience for all of us who were there. But still, there’s no avoiding the profundity of this art and even then there was a melancholic aura around the singer that you felt probably never entirely lifts. Lucky us though to have these incredible songs.

Setlist:

Holland, 1945, Neutral Milk Hotel

July! July! The Decemberists

Song against sex, Neutral Milk Hotel

Postcards from Italy, Beirut

Two-headed boy, Neutral Milk Hotel

In my mind, Amanda Palmer

Ghost, Neutral Milk Hotel

The moon, The Microphones

Oh comely, Neutral Milk Hotel

So you wanna be a superhero, Carissa’s Wierd

Gardenhead/Leave me alone, Neutral Milk Hotel

Some blood for Luna, Dwaal Troupe

Episode 143 - Same band, same song, different version

There’s a growing market nowadays in revisiting your old material.

For the U2s and Taylor Swifts of the universe, the commercial aspects are to the fore. An efficient way to make more millions without the hassle of chancing you hand with new material. Superior recording facilities available from when you were starting off. Alerting newer fans to the hidden reservoirs in your back catalogue you can monetise. Maybe that’s overly cynical, but probably not.

But there are more benign reasons for tracks existing in multiple formats and we cover most of them off in this episode.

Sessions for the John Peel Show allowed artists to experiment in the Maida Vale studios with new material and a studio test run without the commitment to a record company of a finished product. Sometimes the version from the Peel Sessions remains the definitive version (looking at you here, Slits sessions, ‘Blindness’ by The Fall and ‘Dreams Never End’ by New Order). Arab Strap and Pavement Maida Vale session versions are featured here.

There are some very lo-fi demos here which nonetheless exhibit an amateur charm and are well worth hearing by The Cure, Blondie and Nick Drake. Modest Mouse and Afghan Whigs, meanwhile, have donated first drafts of more highly finished versions which appeared later on the same album. Julie Doiron continues the fine tradition of singing your song for a foreign demographic (The Beatles’ early German versions are always amusing) with the Spanish rendition of ‘Belleza Aumentada’.

Sometimes an artist reshapes old songs into new directions. The dubby, woozy version of ‘Where Is My Mind?’ is a legitimate and intriguing interpretation of the author’s own song. On the same album you can find a 15-minute version of the 2-minute song ‘Planet of Sound’, which is well worth a quarter of an hour of your time. Grandaddy do the same thing by re-recording the whole of the Sophtware Slump on a piano. On other occasions an artist can’t seem to quite decide which is the canonical version – see St Vincent’s ‘Slow Disco’ and Red House Painters’ ‘Mistress’.

Whatever the reason, it’s always good to listen to familiar friends and realise that these songs weren’t always the way they turned out. Art, like life, is provisional. Deep stuff!

Tracklist:

First big Peel thing, Arab Strap

The world at large, Modest Mouse

Belleza aumentada, Julie Doiron

Where is my mind, Frank Black

Slow disco, St Vincent

I’ll try anything once, The Strokes

10.15 Saturday night (organ home version), The Cure

Mistress, Red House Painters

If I were going, Afghan Whigs

Here, Pavement

I’m waiting for the man, Lou Reed

Once I had a love, Blondie

Jed’s other poem (Beautiful ground), Grandaddy

Way to blue, Nick Drake

Episode 142 - Lanes, Ways and Automobiles

So I started off with the idea of ‘Planes, Trains and Automobiles’, but rapidly realised that there were three episodes there, not one. So I excised the aircraft and the steam engines and ended up with just the automobiles.

I don’t really like cars. I’ve occasionally worked on an auto client, most recently Mazda. As with nearly all clients (with the exception of plumbing insurers), I end up getting quite interested in their product, and the Mazda history in Australia starts with three-wheelers and a post-war rapprochement. But I can never get past the fact that the USA failed to back electric cars from the outset to protect the interests of the oil barons, and, well, now look where we are.

My son Jamie likes F1. Can’t see it myself. I had a friend who came out from England whose main interest was driving round the Albert Park F1 track. Takes all sorts.

Some great car tracks though, many of which are on this episode. And others about streets, roads and motorways. And has there ever been a more stalkery opening verse than this one by M J Lenderman:

I still have the key

To your boyfriend’s SUV

I keep it by my bed

Like a picture of you and me

I’d be concerned.

Tracklist:

Pontiac 87, Protomartyr

SUV, M J Lenderman

Mashin’ on the motorway, D J Shadow

My red hot car, Squarepusher

Like a motorway, St Etienne

Car crash in G major, fanclubwallet

The English motorway system, Black Box Recorder

Eastern Ave, Flasher

Car song, Elastica

Survival car, Fountains of Wayne

King of the Holloway Road, Bas Jan

Car song, Madder Rose

Headlights fade, Buffalo Tom

Roads, Portishead

Episode 141 - Sibling Bands

Pros and cons of being in a band with your sibling. On the one hand, you’re super sensitive to all the trigger points and know how far you can push him or her before it all explodes. You’ve been stealing each other’s Etch-a-sketch since you were three. On the other hand, if you completely lose it with him or her, like one of the March sisters does in Little Women and burns her sister’s novel manuscript, then all bets are off.

In the “all bets are off” camp first and foremost must come The Kinks. If you only know them from the melodic wistfulness of Waterloo Sunset or Autumn Almanac it might come as a shock to hear about Ray and Dave Davies’s fistfights and the trail of destruction, quite literal in the case of hotel rooms, that they left behind.

Some siblings are more mysterious – what’s it like to be in the wilds of northern Scotland, creating and curating the strange soundscapes of Boards of Canada with just your brother for company? Better than working in an office, for sure. But, well, also a bit weird. I tend to think of them as in their mid-twenties, but they must be in their fifties by now.

Sparks I’ve banged on about before. But I’ll just add that I kinda mentally assumed Ron and Russ shared the same house until I saw The Sparks Brothers documentary. Probably should have given that some more thought. They are, after all, in their mid-seventies now. Maybe it’ll come full circle and they’ll end up in the same nursing home. But meanwhile these dudes are currently embarking on a worldwide tour. Full and massive credit.

Sisters seem maybe to get on more easily in bands. Interviews I’ve read with the Deal sisters, for example (The Breeders) suggest as much. Probably best not to extrapolate too wide ranging a theory from that data point, since see the March sisters above. Brother-sister combos are intriguing – see Fiery Furnaces and Minimal Schlager. Then there are the trio of siblings in The Cribs and Womb. Plenty of scope for old kindergarten grudges to bubble to the surface. And what about The National where there are two, and sometimes three sets of siblings, kicking around, with their secret codes and impenetrable silences.

One final observation - I did a previous episode about ‘Brothers and Sisters’ as a theme, way way back, which you may also be interested in digging out.

Tracklist:

Coffee in the pot, Supergrass

Men’s needs, The Cribs

Here comes the summer, Fiery Furnaces

David Watts, The Kinks

One million kisses, Half Japanese

No aloha, The Breeders

Plateau, Meat Puppets

Star, Belly

Over the horizon radar, Boards of Canada

Scientific romance, Lymbic System

Sylvan’s song, Womb

On this day, And Also The Trees

Safe in your hands, Title Fight

Inside me, Jesus and Mary Chain

Hasta manana monsieur, Sparks

Forbidden fruit, Minimal Schlager

Before the water gets too high, Parquet Courts

Slow show, The National

A great northern river, The Unthanks