I'm all set

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Gasp! So, the third record is finally in the making. Hurrah! And, if you are very quick, you might still be able to purchase a 'special solo performance' on Skype. ;) And, even more good news, this guy has a new record out at the end of May as well. Chris and Mark working together? OMFG. Yes please, Santa. Make it happen.
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Chris Garneau - 'No more pirates' (live) (3.13)
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Love Zombie Central. Yes, I was lucky enough to interview and photograph (!) Chris in May 2007. He played a show at this place, supporting label-friends Xiu Xiu. He was stunningly awesome, whether speaking or singing. Or, actually, just sitting still for a photograph... <3
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The cunt sits at his desk and he's plotting away

 

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The Twilight Sad, @ The Grand Ole Opry, Glasgow, 09-02-12

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It's about loss and death, the hipstah boy with a sharp haircut and letterbox-framed glasses, ponders. It's about past mistakes and associated bitter regrets, the petite girl with a heavily inked back whispers to a friend. It's a homage to post-punk and the memory of Curtis, the group of lads at the bar bellow like horses on heat. It's a necesary step change and shift of gear, argue those in the know, who are close to the band. It's a little too cold, claustrophobic and one-dimensional... I think (and all the better for that, of course). But it is a fucking grower of an album, that's also quite certain. Debates rage. Differences are aired. The record, 'No One Can Ever Know' (Fatcat, 2012), is not long out and already loose words fly around that cul-de-sac called the internet like Aldi plastic bags in a West coast hurricane. As for the show; well, it's a nervous opening night of the tour and Glasgow calls out for their assumed local hero, James Graham. He commands the stage and a dazzling multi-coloured, strobe-heavy, lightshow does indeed create shadows of a certain Stretford local and the voice matches the carefully-placed picture frame, when the technical difficulties are resolved. As would be imagined and expected, the set is mainly populated by tracks from the new long-player but a good half dozen songs are taken from earlier releases; including rather different (keyboard-enhanced) versions of  'Cold Days in the Birdhouse' and 'At the Burnside', to these muddled ears at least. In that odd sense of misplaced symmetry, however, the set opens with the new album closer - 'Kill it in the Morning'. It's a pounding, relentless beginning and the set continues in this styled and somewhat repetitive manner. Indeed, the lack of variation in tempo, mood and positioning is sorely felt; a foray into the other strands of what this band can do (and, yes, does so well) was missed. For example, anyone who has heard their live, acoustic, interpretations of songs like 'Half a Person' or 'The Room' might appreciate these words. But, to be fair, this is perhaps missing the entire point of the show; it's thirteen songs delivered with minimum fuss and architect precision, all shaped and moulded by the keyboards and drums, as well as the finely-pronunciated vocals of Graham. To be sure, the guitars are not exactly redundant or vanquished in this live cowboy show at the Grand Ole Opry; more like set to the touchline to cool down and reappear later in the last quarter. The songs below were clear highlights, as I heard them, but a special mention must also be made for the classic 'I became a Prostitute'. If the band have a signature tune this must surely be it. Tonight they parade at the Queens Social Club, Sheffield; expect a storming of the barricades.

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The Twilight Sad - 'Alphabet' (6 Music Session Version) (4.17)

The Twilight Sad - 'That Summer, at Home I Had Become the Invisible Boy' (4.48)

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Band / Tour / Label (with thanks to Matt Turner/Peenko)

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Set-list: Kill It In The Morning; Don't Move; That Summer, at Home I Had Become the Invisible Boy; Dead City; Reflection of the Television; Alphabet; I Became a Prostitute; Sick; Another Bed; Cold Days From the Birdhouse; Nil; And She Would Darken the Memory; At the Burnside.

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Spurning step by state

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'Ostinato', he urged. An uptight focus paired with singular direction; tears, pain and stubborn mentalities carved into the missing timbre floorboards. Another time escapes, your dacha in the frozen cantata wilds. Heads nod and give way, to a clef misplaced years ago. This looped recording process needs no summer daylight, oils or otherwise, scratching at droned soundboards, fading candles and engineers who know their place only too well. Such inability to sleep or to forget; reflections of self within post-shower puddles of sweated condensation. A captured piano lands a fatal blow in ebony, parched in the distance; whilst drums breeze and wallow through the glissando landscape, from a gallery where 'children stare with heroin eyes'. Guitars fall in and out of step, battered and weeping with the sores of polytonality and scowls of bewildered joy. Scattered throughout this tombstone apartment, his retiring voice resonates, remembers and folds. The guilt and the grieving ends soon, it is written in glee. And, to be fair, he never claimed to be perfect; this deceptive cadence. He never even claimed to be the kind of person who could put one foot in front of the other, let alone one word or note that might grace a European popular hit parade. Making no sense at all, perfectly, mistakes in rhyme and reason as we grow up, whatever age you might have been when the tapes rolled. But, why-oh-why, do we make the same errors of circumstance time and time again? It's enough reason to bow out, come the label-induced curtain coda. Pushed or fell? The one who ultimately knows will never speak, lest the illusion be revealed, and in this truth lies the root beauty and the ugly finale all at once. Encore, at last. The time has come, in edited formation.

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Talk Talk - 'After the flood' (outtake) (4.14)

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Within Without, you. Something to look forward to (Spring 2012).

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You have to start somewhere

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'I would like to be an architect' said the sweaty young Czech student in shining, multi-coloured sports lycra as he exited the local Aldi shop to his pal who, rather bemused, just turned to him and said 'But then why are you doing an economics degree?'. 'Well', said our erstwhile hero, 'You have to start somewhere'. And I think that's exactly it: you have to start somewhere. Even if you don't want to be an architect, in fact.
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Ally Kerr - 'The sore feet song' (3.07)
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The loon bides here, eh.
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We're both at our best in a tight spot

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His assisted height nearly matches his fanciful strides; footloose stomps travelling to a railwayed destination, I would guess. The bag on wheels and A-Z map in hand are the rather unsubtle clues. A bitten cigar tossed carelessly to the side just misses a neatly scarfed woman, on cardboard knees, pleading for offerings from those walking by, the same people pretending to be too busy to acknowledge her being or ordeal. I steal a glance to his side, his left-side, attempting to keep pace with the final furlong approaching. There is no tie but an open-necked wound, a deep shade of colour in his glowing cheeks, matching his apparel, and a harsh wind bites deep into masked layered cracks. I’d thought early fifties, from behind, but perhaps slightly older. The mannerisms, purpose and clothing are deceptive; they scream ‘I Am Interesting’ and ‘I Am Not Dead Yet’. I recognise (some of) the signs and symbols exhibited. We are travelling similar paths, you and I, but are more than a million miles apart in reality. I could never match such poise, movement and direction; this intoxicating mixture had my admiration from first glance. A phone goes off to the sound of an X Factor chart-hit I clearly don’t want to recognise and a swarm of genderless pre-teens shout in unison ‘It’ll be him, fucking well answer it!’ This distraction leads to another; for a moment I lose sight of the target as I am led astray by the smell of a distant, chemically enhanced, Greggs product I can only smell hospitals and nostalgia from. But, there he is. The man in the purple suit. Ahead and bold, steering into the barren station that I also, unwillingly, march towards in search of a future I’m not sure I am ready for.
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The Lucksmiths - 'Self-preservation' (2.03)
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Home / Obtain / Visiting
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A menu of delight and despair

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I keep dropping and lifting the magical needle to hear the same '45 play over and over - 'it's all relative' - whilst at the same time knowing I am absolutely not a relativist. Does this make me a card-carrying hypocrite or merely reading the street-sign entitled 'confused'? I am rather unsure. Er, so, belated good tidings for Christmas and tentative greetings as we speed towards yet another New Year, and all that kind of m'larky. I guess I should offer up my sincere apologies for having very little to say just now. Sorry! I mean, I can't even provide you with a 'best of 2011' type of mix. Ooops. I might get to that by summer 2012, if my current workrate is anything to go by (but, I did post another mix over at 8tracks today, pop-pickers, and some of those songs were released this year!). But, unarguably, I will be a little more miserable during the next twelve months and thus, I am certain, have something more - something potentially interesting - to write about. As a dear friend reminds me, often, I am a fountain of absolute nothingness when not unhappy. Och, really, I can barely find the w... [edit]
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Standard Fare - 'Nuit avec une ami' (3.05)
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'You're a postcode lottery'. Oh no, that's another song. Anyway, buy this album as it is really good. It came out in March 2010, and all that, but I am just catching up.
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PS. The last post, written many days ago now, was eaten whole for DMCA reasons. Apologies for offending, er, Pearl Jam? :(

Ruffled feathers in a coldwave

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Fieldnotes #324
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Lost buttons and used chewing gum; spent matches and tarnished coppers. You search stolen pockets for what you thought was left behind from the night before it began. The loose change cascades into unemployment; stripped fortunes will melt pritt-sticked hearts. Across to the left, behind the till, a pretty girl with a turned down mouth and a fluffy coat waits patiently for a Latte that will take its time to arrive. Stubbed fingers drum in marching time, punching digit holes into an interesting Ikea-lite table. The boy's turtle-shell glasses continually slip down his nose and an index finger rescues the situation time over and again. Scarfs are worn inside, only the gloves are off (literally and metaphorically, as it transpires). You can tell this is a moment that isn't about to last; this is not a relaxed coffee catch-up of old friends or even ex-lovers. It is waiting to happen - and now. You stand to the side for your order, pretending not to witness what you are staring at; you just can't help it. And then she just says it, rather loudly as it turns out. He flinches, hunches and then jumps up in seconds; a pained expression masked in both longing and loathing. He makes to leave, a sugar dispenser hits the floor and smashes into a million pieces. Turning to catch his eyes, 'sorry' is all she can say even though she doesn't mean it. You can see the relief washing over her, like that first sip of coffee after a hard day's night.
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Afraid of Stairs - 'Tell him how you feel' (2.37)
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Step into the light, outside yourself. For a moment in time.
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Look through the round window

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She stares back like she means it; as he sees you, faking it weakly. Those hourglass waterfalls cascade down decorated window frames masking years of poor construction. Passing playmobil cars shuffle and dance, spinning out of time to erratic traffic lights on frozen city centre lakes. Reconstituted families move in bored silence through competing hordes to bargain bin promises within excluded galleries. In the wilderness, out on the steps, forgotten teens without coats or spatial awareness huddle together for meaningless gossip, infectious warmth and heavenly cigarettes. A still, mirrored reflection is caught with a shadow of her presenting utmost; as imagined and played on repeat in soundtrack form. We ache for the taste of Swedish regret in moments like these; passing through the day-to-day lives of others unknown as if we possessed a respectful right to observe, monitor and report. You point and click with tongues hanging out, notebooks at page one. We translate the action figures and reality scenary with error upon mistake upon misplaced empathy. We are they, you are us. It is that time of year: be kind, be true and wish for a hopeful Spring to arrive in tomorrow's, younger, arms. This embrace can never last like you really want it to for, as the song reminds us, "we're lost at sea".
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The Morning Paper - 'A newer taste' (4.26)
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It's getting clearer.
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Hiding in spotlights, not running in shadows

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It's that thing. If I lose you. Again, and so it goes. Stumbling in, falling out.... payday loans are 'Go' in this day and age. Grim, grin... and bear it? No ta. Just like me in this 'visual world'; those ghostly moments of rage, fear, sadness. Tears and the end of time; wheeched away on a Megabus to who knows where. Poundland? Iceland? Where the jumble sale mums go to meet the boil-in-the-bag dads, Brett. Time travel with you beats the odds. In annoyance and irritation of your behaviour, at my ineptness - not knowing what to say or do. You are not her. And she is not the sum of me. Checking the small print for a money back clause. But this is not Argos or even Cash Convertors. Chains broken, head kicked in to awaken from this annual coma. The caustic code isn't written yet as so little is unfamiliar here. Making the familiar strange. But getting stuck on the strange, whilst wearing high heels on a hill pointing downwards. It's an anger based on pain, of insomnia; finding the few, Freud words to ask for assistance. Help is a four letter word though a free prescription is another helpful contribution to this cause not yet lost. It spirals on. What year is this anyway? It's hard to tell if you flick the channels or scan the frequencies. The headlines I remember. It's the same every week. Sink or swim, buying fear, selling souls. You wake up again at 3am, havoc on your mind, and count a pretty blessing that the light is still vacant and out on a date in Germany circa 1972. Prince - the artist - keeps you company as he becomes a butterfly yet again; a slave no more to his poplife <3. Too. Much. Knowledge; information is a fire alarm that won't cease calling you out at inconvenient times, taking names. Snapping and digging and... true, a deep sleep is hard to come by these fallow days. The frightened sirens are set to stun and singing a lonely duet with the drunks rolling past screeching their merlot harmonies in a fake Gregory Italian accent. Bella. Bella. And all that. Or so you think with your ears blocked, your eyes glued shut. No matter how fast you blink reality still heads for the last subway home. And the rain - ah, the pitter patter of rain steering a boo-hoo path down his cracked, shoogily face - it pours over a legoland new town. The stop/go music it plays on repeat in spoken, reverential verse. Thank-you, she says. I accept your challenge of a warm embrace; this invitation South. Rewinding to take it all in - these last six months. Where did it go? Where will it go next? Something is up. Some leave, others stay. All the while Jackie waits on the other side of Poortoun for his lost and weeping children to come home. To roost.
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Life Without Buildings - 'New Town' (5.54)
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It's happening again. No where to go.
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Every landscape is full of ghosts

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Of course, Edward Shanks included the word 'English' in relation to his ghostly landscapes, but it would be foolish to think that such hauntings are the preserve of one nation. Anyway, enough of all that, more NPL indie-pop dancing tomorrow evening. Woot!
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Horse Shoes - 'I can't decide' (3.04)
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Visit / Purchase / Reading
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