Returning. Retro. Revised - New Music 2010 - Part 10

That was then, this is now...

I recently mentioned that I had a few in mind - so here are two of them. They both have line-up changes in their new incarnations and both have a sixties-influenced perspective; however none of the members (current or former) were even born in the 1970s and that is part of why they matter so much. Members of both come from musical family backgrounds, that is true, but rather varied ones.

This album, by Los Angeles based trio 'The Like', appeared in 2006 and it comprised Tennessee Thomas (drums, vocals), Charlotte Froom (bass, vocals) and Z Berg (vocals, guitar). It is retro-styled rock and I like it as much now as I did then. Until very recently I thought that they had vanished without trace. That however is not so.

They are now a four-piece: Tennessee Thomas and Z Berg are joined by Laena Geronimo (bass) and Annie Monroe (electric organ). They have been busy in the studio and this is their first new single. The producer is hardly an unknown, particularly given the influences in the music.

The next is a throwback to the earlier days of 1960's music - a time when female artists did not play instruments.

The 2006 album 'We Are The Pipettes' was something of an anachronism from the start. They looked the part and had an all-male backing band, 'The Cassettes' (then mostly comprising of members of 'British Sea Power'), but they could never have got away with some of the lyrics way back then...

They are back however, now a two-piece as Rosay (Rose Elinor Dougall - who has also been working with Mark Ronson of late) and Riot Becki left to do other things, leaving Gwenno Saunders (centre, above) as the sole surviving member from the line up that recorded and toured the first album. That said even she was a last-minute replacement, recruited at an early 'Pipettes' gig in Cardiff and she has featured in this blog before, in a different guise.

http://rpgreenhalgh.blogspot.com/2007/01/never-judge-artists-from-album-cover.html

Her only co-Pipette is now her sister Ani Saunders. The new album is scheduled for release in June 2010. All, or any, of these acts would be welcome additions to the stages at the coming summer's festivals.

New Music I Want in 2010, part 9 - real new music

I was planning to write something about new albums by returning artists, lots of them indeed, including some very well known ones. I will do so soon but for now they can simply wait because this evening I was distracted by something much more immediate. New music and that by a band from Northern Ireland that has taken the choice, and the chance, to forge its own independent destiny...

www.myspace.com/littlesausagedisorder

http://littlesausagedisorder.blogspot.com

I think that, on balance, they have actually chosen a rather propitious time at which to do so.

Guess who, guess what? - Thoughts on celebrity.

He or she may be well known but it's at a festival and, like the nobodies that you and I are, they have simply decided to let their hair down and enjoy like everyone else. Without doubt you can name a few very recent victims of such things...

If I ever catch the likes of you, maybe a journalist, at a festival you had better be looking and behaving immaculately in every way. You won't see me coming though, because I'll be enjoying it too, without thinking much about how others may see me, just like almost everyone else there and I probably won't know you from Adam anyway.

That in all probability nobody will ever think twice about that is in itself a comforting thought. I prize my anonymity but that does not make me think any less of those who, by dint of their background, career or ambitions, can only forgo that little luxury. The idea of being at a major event and thinking that almost anyone might recognise me would simply petrify me and - if I were there with friends I wouldn't wish it on them for a moment either.

I'm lucky; it is not likely to happen to me any time soon. Yes, I might very well have had one more beer than logic dictates, and you might have had a sneaky fag back-stage, but because we are both unremarkable so is the occurrence. More than once this has resulted in rambling discussions, often with hitherto strangers, that have at the very least attempted to put the world and its music in perspective and I'm not aware that we have regretted any of them. That is, at least in part, what festivals are for...

Thoughts On Lyrics - Skinny Genes

Thanks to the various people who have arrived at 'Thoughts On Music' while looking for the lyric to this song. This has been garnering attention for Eliza Doolittle for some weeks now and, as such, certainly made me pay more attention to yet another improbably young and talented singer-songwriter and one I hope to get the chance to hear live at sometime over the forthcoming festival season. If you happen to be attending one of the UK tours by either Alphabeat or Jamie Cullum then you will probably hear her as the support to one of these rather different artists. That said her own music isn't that easy to pigeon-hole from what I have heard of it - the self-titled 12" EP.

This is the lyric for 'Skinny Genes' as best I can discern, but the usual proviso concerning accuracy applies and if you have any alterations or suggestions please get in touch. Some might say that her approach is quirky, which is I suppose a place to start but as with many such a rather simplistic point of view.

Eliza Doolittle - Skinny Genes

I really don’t like your point of view
I know you’ll never change
Stinging me with your attitude
I've got the mind to walk away

I really don't like your arrogance
Or your policies
You're ninety-nine percent an embarrassment
With just one quality

Chorus:

I don't mind it when you *whistles*
Brings out the best in me when you *whistles*
Show your expertise
When the night always ends with a fight
I'm excited that you wind up next to me

I like it when you *whistles*
Can I have some please of that *whistles*
Satisfy my needs
Sometimes I fake that I hate you and make up
So you wind up next to me

I really don't like your skinny jeans
So take them off for me
Show me what you've got underneath
So we can do this properly

I really don't like the way you smile
When you think you're right
But I will forgive you, the yoke is in the middle
And we're chewing through the wire

Chorus:

I dreamt that you were on a train
And you were leaving, you were leaving
You made me think of what I'd miss
You were leavin', you were leavin'

I don't mind it when you *whistles*
Brings out the best in me when you *whistles*
Show your expertise
When the night always ends with a fight I'm excited
That you wind up next to me

I like it when you *whistles*
Can I have some please of that
Take off your skinny jeans
Sometimes I fake that I hate you and make up
So you wind up next to me

I dreamed that you were on a train
And you were leaving, you were leaving

2009 Festivals - revisited - Part 2

By request here is a larger version of the side-bar image that I posted a week or so ago. It was, perhaps quite obviously, an incomplete post. That was not the original plan but, as it happened, it is now going to be an incremental one...

Well, finally, I have got round to adding another artist but this is one less well known.

Jess Elva and band live at EOTR 2009, in the Tipi Tent, early Saturday afternoon.
Watch out for more from the Swiss/Australian, and her band, very soon.

And you never did learn to let the little things go.

And you never did learn to let me be.

And you never did learn to let little people grow.

And you never did learn to see.

And I am lower now and lower still

And you did always say that one day I would suffer.

You did say that people get their pay.

You did always say that I was going places

And that you wouldn't have it any other way.

But I couldn't turn my back

On a world for what I lack wouldn't let me

But I couldn't turn my back

On a world for what I like I need it.

Lyrics from 'Blackberry Stone' by Laura Marling, an artist now confirmed for Latitude 2010.

Icons lost.

It is with much sadness that I heard that a second icon of pop music has passed away in as many months. Today it was Malcolm McClaren, most famous for managing 'The Sex Pistols' in their ascendency to ultimate disaster.

Last month it was Charlie Gillett, best known for his championing of world music on the wider stage and using his BBC radio profile to take it to a whole new audience. The strange thing is that, by happenstance quite different operators, they both championed diversity and 'world music'. McClaren was championing hip-hop before we knew what it was while, during the aftershocks of the punk earthquake, Gillett was championing and then managing Dire Straits.

It seems strange now, thirty-something years later, to imagine just how profoundly music has changed. It has never been the same again and Pete Doherty is still alive unless you know otherwise: neither is a bad thing.

The Optimist - the difficult second album...

I've wondered about this for a long while and the wait turned out to be longer than perhaps anyone intended, as circumstances conspired to make it more difficult than perhaps it might have been.

The thing is that I still love 'Fantastic Playroom' as it has so many memories for me too [see here] and I thought that, without reason and not for lack of talent, its successor could fail to live up to the expectations that I would have of it.

Many circumstances mean that the exuberant pop, and sometimes nu-trance influenced sound of 2007, probably wasn't going to work quite so well in 2010 and for more than a few reasons; not all of them down to the music-buying public.

First single 'Chaos' is just about sufficiently familiar and comforting to remind why NYPC were so impressive the first time out. If you want my reference points on 'Fantastic Playroom' it reminds me slightly of 'The Get Go' or, perhaps more so, 'Talking, Talking', which was the most soul-searching song on the first album.
The bulk of the second album is however more uniformly reflective but also very accomplished in its repositioned mood - and the title mirrors this sentiment - without becoming either maudlin or self-indulgent.

Catching the zeitgeist once may have been just good fortune; to do it twice takes time and patience.

2009 Festivals - revisited - Part 1

Having written about a few of the acts that I would like to see at Festivals in 2010 it made me think more about some that I saw in 2009 that to all intents and purposes were quite unknown to me but mattered a great deal, adding considerably to my enjoyment.

Leeds' 'Bear Driver', on the Tipi Stage Sunday lunchtime at EOTR 2009.

This band was very good indeed.

They were far from being one of the best known bands there but were certainly well worthy of the spot. Only four of them are in this picture but they are, in fact, a six-piece and one we deserve to hear much more of in 2010.

Recording pains - Beth Jeans Houghton

I've never recorded anything original myself, let alone an album, so here are some thoughts by one - who I saw live at EOTR 2009 - about the process of recording her soon-to-be-released first album. The album from, should you have forgotten, the artist who claims she appeared from the depths of Buttermere, simply has to have been worth the wait. Recording it has however not been without some trials and tribulations...

"Frantically finishing recording for the forthcoming album with Ben Hillier.

On Thursday we invited a lot of my friends down to be recorded as a BIG BAD CHOIR on 'Golden' and 'I Will Return, I Promise'. Twenty three people came, including the Hooves, half of Stornoway, Mike Lindsay from Tunng, the boy who sells me coffee in the morning, Dr. S. Tud Luvcub, Jessica Rabbit and Kola, a man I met on the street that morning. The punk song we recorded is called 'Prick AKA Sean' and it's about a drunk Glaswegian man who had a fight with our tour manager in a Travel Lodge in Coventry when we were on tour with Stornoway. The prize line being 'Goodnight, sweet dreams and f**k off'. He [Kola] was lovely, he really was."

If you think that the foregoing sounds improbable in the extreme consider this, the text on the inner sleeve of 2009 EP 'Hot Toast - Volume 1'.

Festival wish list - New Music 2010 - Part 8

To finish what has, aside from music and a great weekend in North Wales, been a rather lack-lustre month I thought I would add some things that have caught my attention in the last few weeks. When I started about two hours ago I had a pretty clear plan in mind; that it became well and truly wrecked on the rocks of new discoveries is just one of those things and also for the longer term good...

These are just some of the acts I originally intended to mention. I've mentioned some of these artists, if only in the side-bar, already so here are a few of them. In truth the list of those still to mention is actually now longer than it was when I started!

Esben and The Witch, Brighton, UK.

Exquisite, romantically inclined, comfortingly gothic (and occasionally electro-acoustic) new-traditional: I recommend any song you can find and they are confirmed as playing Truck Festival 2010. Last year's 'Marching Band' served as a shot across the bows of the competition, and my God has the competition become formidable on all fronts, but the one track that sticks in my mind just now is the more recent 'Lucia At The Precipice'.

The Ruby Suns, New Zealand.
Their album 'Fight Softly' is already available (released by UK label Memphis Industries) and they are confirmed to appear at End Of The Road 2010.

Ones that I have not mentioned before, and that I'd like to see live, are:

Beach Fossils, Brooklyn, NY.
I have heard a few songs and 'Day Dream' is not atypical.

Islands Lost At Sea, Bolton, UK.

The début album is 'are having a lovely time' and to be released in the UK on 26 April.

I could, and soon will, add more but it is past that time tonight. A few throw-away suggestions including, perhaps, some returning acts less well known:

Operator Please! - Australian five-piece in support of their second album 'Logic', due shortly.

New Young Pony Club - new album 'The Optimist' represents a distinct realignment by Ty Bulmer and the crew following 'Fantastic Playroom', which was their 2007 début. For more on this album see here:

http://rpgreenhalgh.blogspot.com/2010/04/optimist-difficult-second-album.html

Mythology revisited - New Music 2010 - Part 7

It may seem that I have posted much about new music from major labels in 2010. That is true but here is something very different.

If I were to start to mention an album that tells a story - in the sense of a drama - you might reasonably think that at best I have come over all 1970's prog-rock.

Hadestown is a rather different proposition.

It is Anaïs Mitchell's fourth album and by leagues the most ambitious: it tells the Greek legend of Orpheus and Eurydice but is set in depression-era New Orleans. It is an Americana opera in which Mitchell sings the part of Eurydice while that of Orpheus is played by Justin Vernon (of Bon Iver renown).
The record is released (on 26 April in the UK) by Righteous Babe Records and its founder, Ani DiFranco, sings the part of Persephone while veteran Iowan folk singer/songwriter Greg Brown takes that of the careworn Hades. Ben Knox Miller (The Low Anthem) also plays a part...
This is a fine 'cast' but what makes it work the way it does is the song writing and the arrangements. That is all down to Mitchell.

Interwoven threads. Or just a tangled mess?

This is a fundamental question, one that long predates this blog, and it is a multipartite one. Each is a simple question, at least in isolation and on the face of it, that I have asked myself but as a whole the answer certainly is not remotely clear to me...

Here are some of the questions:

Why do I like music?
Why do I like the music I do, but not that which I don't?
Why has my taste in music changed, particular in the medium - long term?
How are these things related, if indeed they are, in any logical sociological, psychological or even physiological way?

They are not easy to answer, although I would like to try and do so and happily share my answers. Now ask those, and many other such related questions, in combinations and permutations, and the whole thing suddenly becomes almost infinitely complex.

My first comment is blindingly obvious; that I do not know the answer.
That actually matters more for perhaps we are not supposed to know the answer as, regardless of all the huge progress that has been made on our collective science and psychological understanding of the human brain that which we now know, or think we do, still does not register on the scale of that which there is to know.

Two albums, one evening, and I just don't see a problem with it.

Who is to say that I should not listen to bombastic Canadian pyschedelic rock and then immediately follow it with an album of lo-fi acoustic melancholia, if that is what I wish to do?

End Of The Road 2010

'New Pornographers' will swap the ice-hockey rink for Larmer Tree Gardens in September 2010.

They will be joined, inter alia, by the following confirmed acts:

The Mountain Goats, The Low Anthem, Iron & Wine, Black Mountain, Wilco

Dengue Fever -- Felice Brothers -- The Unthanks

AA Bondy, The Antlers, Elliott Brood, Cate Le Bon, Citay, Cymbals Eat Guitars, Daredevil Christopher Wright, Deer Tick, Diane Cluck with Anders Griffen, Django Django, DON’T MOVE!, Frank Fairfield, Forest Fire, Jonny Kearney & Lucy Farrell, Ladyhawke, Jessica Lea Mayfield, Mountain Man, Nurses, Papercuts, Phosphorescent, Joe Pug, The Ruby Suns, Snowman, The Fresh & Onlys, Timber Timbre, The Wilderness Of Manitoba...

...and a whole lot more yet to be revealed. Tickets are on sale now:
http://www.endoftheroadfestival.com/tickets/

It is all looking pretty good... I'm going to add links to the artists when and where I can, not least because I enjoyed and appreciated reading them myself. They are not intended to be definitive, and certainly not comprehensive, rather a guide to how I understand the chosen artists might relate one to another.

One of the many outstanding performances of EOTR 2009 was that by 'The Low Anthem' on the Garden Stage on a glorious, sunny Saturday afternoon and they are to return in 2010.

For those who are still doubters...

Charlie Darwin

Set the sails I feel the winds a'stirring

Toward the bright horizon set the way

Cast your wreckless dreams upon our Mayflower

Haven from the world and her decay

And who could heed the words of Charlie Darwin

Fighting for a system built to fail

Spooning water from their broken vessels

As far as I can see there is no land

Oh my god, the water's all around us

Oh my god, it's all around

And who could heed the words of Charlie Darwin

The lords of war just profit from decay

And trade their children's promise for the jingle

The way we trade our hard earned time for pay

Oh my god, the water's cold and shapeless

Oh my god, it's all around

Oh my god, life is cold and formless

Oh my god, it's all around.

That is just the first track of many but do you yet know (2007 album) What The Crow

Brings?

Cover versions and the potential dangers thereof...

Cover versions and the dangers thereof... This is something that I have thought long and hard about for some time. I'm sure that we can all suggest some that would have been better left alone, either because the original was uninspiring (though that is not of necessity a disaster) or that the cover was in itself a travesty of the original. Not so long ago I thought that one or other of these scenarios was the normal outcome but now I'm not so sure... The resurgence of live music has made me think this for several reasons but only sporadically have I mentioned it because it has mainly occurred to me when I have seen live bands...

It is in effect off-record, should it not work out as planned, although very often it does, and the more well known the original the greater the danger. That difficult second album then, so why not? I can think of many who will not like this, some on a matter of principle, but it is very sound indeed and I like it. My opinion is not to be bought whatever anyone, and the likes of NME, might like to believe.

On the other hand this is brave beyond belief. She got away with it too methinks.

Radiohead, David Bowie, Lily Allen Blast BBC Over 6 Music Closure Threat

Radiohead, David Bowie, Lily Allen Blast BBC Over 6 Music Closure Threat

A battle we should not have to have ...

The BBC is, I would unreservedly contend, a bastion of public service broadcasting across all formats. It is also, in many of them, available at no cost to those in much of the free world on radio (including the World Service in many languages) or via internet.
It now needs your input and support, wherever you may be and whatever you like about it, more than ever before. Becoming insular, in the modern world, is the last thing anyone needs...

http://twitter.com/rpgreenhalgh

I was determined to say at least something right now. Idealism is a virtue; if only an seemingly unattainable one.

IT DOESN'T HAVE TO BE LIKE THIS!

In a year that will see the UK voting for a government here is the chance to practise and, with good fortune, make a real difference. If you think that broadcasting matters then so does politics; more than ever one cannot now have one without the other and this applies whatever political opinion you may, or may not, hold. The important thing is to have an opinion whether or not others agree with it.

If you don't act on it by voting, or otherwise participating, you can hardly then claim that the outcome was a travesty. The time to act is now and it has never been easier to do something.

http://www.petition.fm/petitions/6musicasiannet/1000/

If all this seems a bit direct, perhaps because you have not campaigned on such an issue before, let me assure you that this is not going to put you on some 'list' of traitors and terrorist suspects.

It most certainly won't. What it will do is show that you care about democracy and that you are are actually prepared to put it in to words and that need not be a scary prospect. Here is a link that explains how to go about it in a persuasive, professional way...

http://www.jrhunt.co.uk/2010/03/02/how-to-save-6music/

This advice also applies to BBC Asian Net too, of course, and indeed any other service on a far wider plane that is also threatened. We have become too used to grumbling in private while contributing little that is focussed on the wider, often political, debate.

It is a typically British fault, in many respects, and accordingly I'm not advocating revolution for one moment or even suggesting other less drastic direct action, such as strikes or boycotts.

Popular revelation, even revulsion, can be the most powerful force for change.

Burnin' For You... Thoughts on Music 2010

Things are looking interesting on the music front once again.

The big UK festivals have for the most part announced their headline acts, and they are a hard-hitting collection, but as is customary 'Festival Republic' has not. This means that those for Leeds/Reading and Latitude 2010 are as yet unknown. The same, as far as I am aware, also goes for the 2010 'V Festivals'. The why and when of this does not overly concern me; the main stage headliners for Latitude 2010 will no doubt be revealed on the day that the tickets go on sale - 9 March 2010. I went last year and had a fantastic time but I didn't bother with any of them... The acts on other stages, and those lower on the main stage playing order, held plenty of promise and that was of more interest to me.

It is the 'Award Season': the NME awards are taking place in London as I write and they are in general messier than events such as last week's 'Brits' but no less worthy. I have found it tempting to start a 'wants lists' of bands I would like to see this summer and needless to say it is already a long one that includes all manner of currently less well known acts. That is what interests me and it has served me well this last two years...

The really interesting thing that takes place in the forthcoming weeks is SXSW and it can have a considerable influence.

I'm not making predictions; who am I to do that? I do however have some ideas about the artists, or genre of artists, I expect to see.

I like it like this.

'Brits 2010' - Some first thoughts

Well, a few days later, I have to say that the 'Brits 2010' was in my opinion much better than for some time. I say that for two reasons: firstly it was well presented and an all-round good production but more importantly, and even if I don't like them, the winners were the deserving ones.

I'm not really of the JLS generation but they deserved a 'Brit'. Lady GaGa got what she got, not just to remind the UK that it isn't the centre of the world and music is no exception, simply on merit. In the same category of merit were Florence and The Machine and Dizzee Rascal so it is not that Britain lacks talent, far from it, and their duet was quite something. That brings me on to N'Dubz - who could have imagined this of UK hip-hop just a couple of years ago?

Summary: brilliant.

It all reminded me of this album from 2001 in some ways...

New York, white, female, hip-hop and, like Madonna and GaGa of Italian heritage, Concetta Kirschner is recognisable as an icon of the genre and she is still busy, with a new album soon. In the meantime 'Life Is But A Dream' is available on 7" now...

Forecast: expect more surprises in 2010. The nominees for the 2011 'Brits' could be very interesting indeed.

I Speak Because I Can - Laura Marling

Here it is at last:

It includes 'Alpha Shallows' and 'Goodbye England (Covered In Snow)' which, if you are a fan of 7" vinyl, you will recognise from that format.

I've just listened to it all for the first time, twice back-to back, and the result is oddly as damning as it is a revelation. The album is quite remarkable and yet I should have known that this kind of music could be so rooted in time and simultaneously so fresh.

There are two sides to this observation: I now think I could be better versed in the first wave of new-folk, realized well before she was born and 'Rambling Man' is a case in point; and I'm now acutely aware that this is not something in isolation here in the UK but rather that it lies on a wider plane.

I could find out about a new artist of this genre every few days without trying, which makes me think that this summer's festivals could be very interesting indeed and more on that soon, but equally I now know I need to listen to the classics of the first blooming that have to some extent passed me by. Joni Mitchell is one that comes to mind but I can think of plenty of others...

It is not that the new generation necessarily sounds like them, rather it is the influence and the ethos that matter.

I Tried To Do Hand-stands For You...

It is time for some new 'thoughts', more lyrics and a whole lot of new music, but I tend to fail on the vaulting of my ambition.

The most evident utensil

Is nothing but a pencil

and, from different tracks on the same album...

Permanently black and blue

Permanently blue for you.

All the garbage that you have thrown away

Is waiting somewhere a million miles away.

Your condoms and your VCR

Zip-lok bags and your father's car

Dark and silent, wait for you, yea-hey

And so much garbage will never ever decay.

And just four hints for now:

Esben and The Witch

iLiKETRAiNS - album #2

The Joy Formidable - album #2

Blood Red Shoes - Fire Like This

...and a whole lot more to follow. Guess what? I am not a robot...

'White Holes of Mole Hills', anyone, Ruth Theodore (2010)?

Some thought it was facetious on my part and others saw it for what it was. It is real and another worthy of note in the nu-folk canon, artist and album both. It is released on February 15, 2010 by River Rat Records.

Was It Worth It - Jeremey Warmsley and Elizabeth Sankey (aka Summer Camp) seem to think so...

..and (for what it is worth) so do I, very definitely.

Higher Powers - 6 Day Riot - the album lyrics

It is mostly done and, given the new-found popularity of 'Every Third Sunday', I thought it a shame not to share all the lyrics for 6 Day Riot - Have A Plan.

Run For Your Life

And morning comes with a meltdown, this town is needing a shakedown, we've

been burning bridges for hours: guided by higher powers. And rising up from the

edges this land is covered with faces we've been praying for someone to lead us, the

end of those who deceive us. Ooh if I was you I'd run for your life. Her face is in every

paper and may we never forget her... A nation cries together, hoping to remember.

Look back at roads we have taken, as sleeping giants awaken, counting days till

tomorrow we'll beg steal and borrow. It's not the time to stand in line if you wanna

change this. They'll make the world you measure by if you let them take you. And hand

you to the darker side where everything's about you, it's not the time to stand in line

someone has to change this.

O Those Kids

O those kids, those kids won't bat an eyelid if we don't change a

thing. I risked my mind, I risked my mind and sanity to give you

what you need. I'm drowning. I'm leaving this life we made.

I'm drowning, my last thought's of all the money we'll make.

We'll make. O my dear, now don't you fear, just another day

and we'll be done. O my dear now don't you fear, just another day

and the money's coming quick and fast. We'll spend! We'll spend!

We'll spend! O those kids...

Be With Me

I look inside your mind and hide beneath this bed, the sheets are cold tonight the

shapes all blur to life. As I pray for you and watch you as you sleep, as I wait

my turn I hope that you will be with me, we'll find what only the wise men seek.

They hang around in pairs with boards that hold your name, a tick or two for you

could mean another day. As I hold my breath and wait to hear some word, as I beg

for rest I hope that you will be with me, we'll find what only the wise men seek and

though it's hard to tell what only wise men seek. We took a risk our way;

we fought to know, we took a risk our way; open and closed. Come on and tell us,

come on and show us.

Every Third Sunday

If you take this wrong then time will stop, wasted spaces move back

up; many days have rolled into one. Daily meals to calm your eyes,

wisdom seldom realized I could try to reason one more time.

But by the by, by the by, how fear has multiplied wild and lost within

your state of mind. My oh my, my oh my, how tears have multiplied

drowned and lost within your state of mind. To the edge and round the

bend, stubborn till the bitter end hold on tight before this whole

town blows. Get up get up and face the day don't let those hours slip away,

chasing time and talking hate again. I'm drowned and lost within your

state of mind.

Rise Above

Rise above, rise above, rise above all the lies and hatred and new-fangled love,

could you find a way to turn this all around? Wide awake, wide awake, wide awake

as the morning turns another page and the anger lies sleeping one more day.

But oh to be like you, a stranger to all we knew, to hold yourself above what

might be true. Walk away, walk away, walk away turn your back on all that we

once made let the mountain rise upon this land. I don't know, I don't know,

I don't know you could count the lives that have been lost but still your mind

rests firmly on your own. But oh to be like you, a stranger to all we know,

to hold yourself above what might be true.

So You're A Writer

So you're a writer but can you hear this? You've been chasing circles all across

those pages. Another landslide and they're all cheering, got your people outside

every doorway listening. Bring it back to mine, slip back into line, it's harder to

deny so bring it back. You'd take my own mind to hide your old lies and try to save

face if only just to rise above us. So lie in wait there and toast your genius, raise your

glass high while everthing around you crumbles. Bring it back to mine, slip back

into line, it's harder to deny, it's harder when you go sailing past this place take that

trip back round. All a game planned in your mind take that trip back round. These

last days have multiplied the thoughts you hoped to hide as you go sailing past your

soul take that trip back round.

Breakdown

Never thought, never thought to wonder if you heard all that I said, if my house isn't

there any longer then I guess I've burnt that bridge. How.m I ever gonna fight this breakdown

if I'm dead from the waist down? If I thought I could take this over then I might earn

my name, as I lie and wait, lie and wait for answer lie and wait, lie and wait in vain.

How'm I ever gonna fight this breakdown if I'm dead from the waist down. Undo my mind

rewind our time. On the face in the face of all this, like you, like me, like he, it's all I thought

I ever wanted all I thought I'd ever be. How'm I ever gonna fight this breakdown if I'm

dead from the waist down. Undo my mind, rewind our time. Every word that I encounter

holds an old part of me. all the books I've ever opened lie floating on the sea, and my clothes

don't even matter if I have nothing more, could you stay a little longer, help take away

the noise. How'm I ever gonna fight this breakdown if I'm dead from the waist down,

undo my mind, rewind our time.

Go! Canada

Oh we sailed for days to find this view before us, there lies the land an inch or two

below us. Take a look around you'll see the flags are raised again, and rising from

the earth the theatre beckons us along. Way beneath the swell they laugh at our

misfortune. All that holds our wealth lies washed up in Dalston. We fought our

way through broken years to conquer, there lies the land an inch or two below us.

Wave across the rolls at red and white united, may we return another day to find this.

Oh we're losing you, drink to forget what is right. Oh saluting you, drink just to sleep

through the night.

Rise Again

Chasing the circles and fighting the cause it's now that we have come for.

it's now that we needed. Inside your pocket, lined with our gold you hide your

intentions and hold our restless souls. But oh we will rise once more, ignore

those fearful men. I'll try to regain my strength for now I can breathe again.

Lost in the moment still biding our time we swim for this promise and hold

the dark line, now with momentum we run with the waves we're dying to meet

you, we're dying to know your name. To know your name...

Long Slow March

In this place not a face that I can trust, not a scene to be believed it's changing...

From each door to the boot of my car they follow every move I'm making.

Like age they'll take my mind, like years they'll take my sight, a long slow march

through the night, a long slow march tonight. To the next I hear each word I

breathe a stranger to deceive, I'm on you. Here you stand a brother in each sense

but eyes that I can't place: do I know you? Like age they'll take my mind, like years

they'll take my sight, a long slow march through the night, a long slow march tonight.

Previous posts on this topic:

Every Third Sunday - 6 Day Riot

While you're at it why not also check out this CD from 2004...

From Home To Home - Tamara Schlesinger

So much to listen to...

After the customary slow start to the year new music suddenly seems to be bursting out from all sorts of expected and unexpected places! It may still be winter on all counts but the joys of spring seem to have appeared like the first brave snowdrops.

I'll try and add more in the next few days but for now here is another band from the US:

Audio Fiction come from New York and, having only found out about the band on Sunday, I listened to the two free mp3s, 'Way Out' and 'Suffocate', available on download from the website. I like what I heard and the self-titled CD is on order from cdbaby.com.

Have you have ever wondered what late 80s and early 90s New York indie pop-rock might sound like, if it were tinged with a no-shit punk attitude and reinvented in 2010? Well now you have an answer:

Wonderful.