Certainly triggered

It’s the dreaded British indie episode of ‘Seven Ages Of Rock‘ tonight. I’ll be recording it, as ‘Jekyll’ is on at the same time, but whenever I get around to viewing it I’ll report back on how traumatised I was by the whole experience. I guess there’s a chance they’ll do it well.

Ha!

Maximo Park live from the Oxford Union tonight on Channel 4, apparently. It’s one of those Vodaphone TBA things, that seem to exist only to get the name ‘Vodaphone’ into the tv listings. And blogs, evidently.
Maximo Park are my current love affair. I have a habit of throwing myself into the collecting of a band or artist as soon as that magic ‘click’ occurs and I realise their greatness. I’ve stubbornly held out on Maximo Park for some time, but thinking back, I’m not sure why. I took a punt on ‘Our Earthly Pleasures‘ back in April because the CD was fairly cheap, and realised that they weren’t at all bad. A chance to buy the special edition of the debut at a good price ensured that that was in the collection too. However, the adoration didn’t happen until the Glastonbury performance (See video clip in a previous post.) They delivered a blistering live set and suddenly I realised what I’d been missing.
As a result, this week has involved tons of Maximo Park stuff pouring through the letterbox, including a multi-coloured pile of 7″ singles, a Japanese b-sides collection, a limited edition CD/DVD book thingy and both albums I already own, but this time on vinyl. Ok, so they didn’t come through the letterbox, but you get the idea. I have form for this kind of behaviour. But, it’s not like I don’t listen to it all, and thoroughly enjoy it.
I really do recommend that you check out the Field Music re-version of ‘I Want You To Stay‘, available on the single of that name, or for download via the excellent Bleep.
The music’s spiky, the lyrics are just the right side of odd and the presentation is perfect. An indie band that’s a cut above the rest. It’d be nice to hear about an act such as this lot on tonight’s ‘Seven Ages’, but I suspect it’ll be the Oasis show. I’d love to be proved wrong.

It’s just MVC repeating itself…

And so it was confirmed today – Fopp is dead. Internet rumours suggest that the staff were told in an email, yesterday afternoon, that they were out of work and would not be receiving their pay for June. A fairly shabby way to treat your staff, especially when they’ve been having to trot out nonsense excuses to the public for the last week.
I used to love Fopp. I first discovered it whilst at uni. The first few visits were slightly too overwhelming to result in actually spending all that much. That was a problem I soon ironed out and was frequently to be found exiting with £40 worth of CDs and books every couple of weeks. The nearby rival in Nottingham is ‘Selectadisc‘, who altered their pricing policy to be competitive against Fopp’s ‘pile it high, sell it low’ approach. It was at this point that I realised that if continued to do what I was doing – and, let’s face it, many other people in the city were doing the same – then one of my favourite record shops, Selectadisc, was losing previously guaranteed custom. This wasn’t so much of an issue while Fopp was still genuinely different to all of the big stores, but in the last few years it was becoming predictable and faceless. Far too much of the stock and pricing was interchangeable with HMV and Virgin. Vinyl disappeared from many of their stores and the few remaining bargains tended to be in the book section. My spending in Fopp tailed off dramatically, and while I’ve still used them in recent years (£25 last month on the Sly & The Family Stone reissues alone) it had lost that excitement factor that musos feel when going out record shopping.
My loyalties were even more torn in recent weeks when I found out about the plans for a new Fopp in the Eagle Centre redevelopment in Derby. As I may have mentioned in the past, I have an unhealthy love of Reveal Records in that their city. It’s like a big blanket in winter, and a chilled foreign beer in the summer. I can never buy only one thing in there, and their constant 2 for £20 and 2 for £18 offers (on vinyl as well as CD) ensure that each desired item is suitably paired off. I popped in today and spent twice as much as I had intended to. The staff are friendly and knowledgeable. The stock is varied, well-presented and competitively priced. They’ve got a healthy vinyl section and the shop is light and airy. It is, to my mind, the best record shop in the UK.
Another rumour that circulated the internet in recent times (and I restate that this is nowt but a rumour) was that there was a bonus available to Fopp staff in new branches, if they killed off the local indie store within months of opening. Now, this does sound rather like fanciful nonsense put about by those poor indie stores that are on their last legs, the length and breadth of the country, but it does fit with the increasingly sour image of Fopp in recent times.
I hope to see them breathe again in some capacity. If only so I can have one more visit. But it’s unlikely that it can be a going concern as a business. I can’t really envisage a time without physical record shops, but it’s clearly becoming harder and harder to even break even. I was worried the day that it was announced that Fopp had bought up the Music Zone stores and sadly those fears have proved to be justified.
They treated music fans well for a while. How about justice for the staff?

Woop-dee-bleeding-doo

Left-Legged Pineapple in Loughborough (a record shop) closes this week. Fopp appear to be in serious trouble as a result of their takeover of Music Zone and HMV are preparing to launch new stores in the Borders mould so that they can reduce their rent in each city by not needing an HMV store and a Waterstone’s.
Thank fuck then that music has been saved.

The Spice Girls are getting back together.

Yup. Named after a Wilco lyric.

Still obsessing over Maximo Park. I’ll be writing about that ‘I must buy everything they’ve ever released’ feeling tomorrow.
In the meantime, someone else for you to check out.
The quite sublime, Cherry Ghost. This song is out on 7″ and CD this week.

Just a bit good!

Not much on telly tonight

Glastonbury Revelations:
Well, if you can’t change the format on your own site, where can you? Glasto only this week so that I can tidy up my views on the festival.
Editors – how can he sound like that but look like that? Doesn’t really look tortured enough to sing the kind of harrowing tunes that they specialise in. Bloody good, though. Tight play, decent vocals and a fired up crowd. New stuff sounded just as good as the debut album, which is no mean feat when playing prior to release.
Super Furry Animals - only caught fifteen minutes of this before going out on Friday, but it was a joy. Few bands can make me dance like a twat and nod like a muso at the same time. SFA are one of them. ‘Northern Lites‘ in a Big Star/Teenage Fanclub style was a gem and ‘Hello Sunshine‘ sounded like a Sixties classic that should have been a worldwide smash. They’re just so charming. New material was broadcast; most notably the new single, ‘Show Your Hand‘. A world-beater if you ask me. In at 27 if you ask the British public.
The Who – great value entertainment. Roger’s voice isn’t what it was, but Pete’s guitar playing was superlative in the extreme and to be fair to Mr Daltrey, his ability to catch the mic without looking is a fantastically precise science.
Arctic Monkeys - a no frills headline set from a band hitting their stride. Wasn’t sure with album one, but completely sold second time around.
Maximo Park - I’ve been quite fond of this lot for a little while now. I’d recently picked up the debut album and was content with another ‘indie band I quite like’. However, their set on Saturday night was near perfect. A charismatic frontman, tight musicianship, belting tunes being sung back by the crowd and every single member of the group looking like it was the happiest day of their various lives. The thirty minute highlights package was essential viewing – so much so that I watched it three times.

The Stinkers
Paolo Nutini – I’m reminded of a Ross Noble routine about a drunk talking into his can of special brew. What a bizarre voice! Somewhere between comical and genuinely disturbing.
Kaiser Chiefs - Bloody sing! Stop shouting. People will stop loving you pretty bloody quickly if you think you can piss away that much good will in just over an hour. Smug, clowning and vacant. Like Robbie Williams pre-’Angels‘.
The Killers - Terrible shouty cobblers and way too close to the posturing of The Darkness. It confirmed for me that ‘Sam’s Town‘ really was that shit.

You can watch plenty of these performances over at the BBC site until next weekend. http://www.bbc.co.uk/glastonbury

And it’s still raining

The Manics did ok, although I think I prefered the interview with Zane afterwards. Not their natural environment, but they were fairly well received, and Nina from The Cardigans managed to stick to the tune of ‘Your Love Alone Is Not Enough’. Only caught a bit of Beirut, but it looked bloody great. I was asked how I’d describe them and I was reminded of a review I read that said something along the lines of, “it’s the album of the decade. That decade being the 1920s” or somesuch. For me it’s cossack-folk with hippy love sprinkled all over it.

The Kaiser Chiefs appeared to be all bluster and self-worship with piss-poor vocals just to top it all off. Alex Greenwald managed to cause all kinds of mental anguish for security by climbing up into the gantry during Mark Ronson’s performance while doing his vocal on ‘Just‘. All good fun, but didn’t really add to the experience of the really rather good studio album.

Chemicals looked ace, but it’s not really what you want blaring out of the telly late on a Sunday night. In fact, that seems to be exactly what The Who were made for. BBC2 has been broadcasting them for a solid hour and fifteen minutes as I type this. Fair play to them for that. Poor old Roger’s voice isn’t what it was, but they can still put on a decent show. The Gossip are on one of the other stages. I just don’t get the appeal.

Well, there’s plenty to mull over for the final comment on the weekend, but a number of acts did themselves proud. Plenty of mediocrity as always, mind.

Gum boots

Editors were outstanding. Maximo Park pulled an absolute blinder. Sometimes all it takes is one fantastic festival performance to put everything into place. Certainly the case for me and, as almost certainly nobody calls them, the Park.
Seth Lakeman had his moments. Mika didn’t. Neither did Bassey. Young Knives sounded a little bit all over the place, as did The Rumble Strips, although I think they’re meant to sound like that. The Killers were as dull as you might expect. Wasn’t entirely convinced by Weller for once, and didn’t quite sense the majesty of CSS that everyone else seems to think is present. Nice of BBC3 to give us all of five minutes of the Manics. Bit of a weird day in terms of coverage. Edith Bowman really is one the most depressingly uninteresting individuals to ever have walked this fair planet of ours. Mind you, I’m even finding Lauren Laverne annoying this weekend, and I normally have plenty of time for whimsical ways.
I’m going to delay the ‘Revelations Of The Week‘ until tomorrow so that I can do a Glasto special.
In the meantime, if you need to do some homework, the place to go is the BBC Glasto site.

I prefer marmalade

What in the name of all things bizarre and freakish is Paolo Nuttella‘s live performance from Glastobury all about? Is he slurring? Is he doing it on purpose? Has someone told him it sounds good? It’s genuinely uncomfortable viewing, and not just because it involves watching, and unfortunately hearing, the songs of Paolo Nuttella.
The Dirty Pretty Things set looked promising from the three minutes we got of it earlier, and the highlights of yesterday have been enjoyable enough. That’s what I like about the Beeb’s Glasto coverage. While never particularly essential, it’s comforting like cricket commentary on the radio. Plus, with the red button, it introduces an element of mental anguish as you sit there constantly worrying that you might be missing out on something good over on one of the other video streams.

But it is still essentially an end

I think it’s safe to say that the Editors are never going to release an album called ‘Ten Songs About Picnics and Wanking‘. The new album, ‘An End Has A Start‘ picks up where ‘The Back Room‘ left off. It’s slightly more relentless in terms of maintaining the pressure throughout and the production is a little smoother, but the all-encompassing sense of dread that was so successful on the debut is still the key-selling point. I’ve not played it enough to offer any valuable insights on lyrical quality, but it does seem to have the tunes. I get the feeling that there’s a bit of a backlash against them already, which I don’t really understand. It seems that there is a suggestion that with the sheer wealth of bands out there people are only adoring the ‘next big thing’ for one album, before moving on. If you liked ‘The Back Room‘ then I can’t imagine you being anything other than delighted with ‘An End Has A Start‘. The vinyl comes in a kind of thick yellow tracing paper inner sleeve that wears through on all sides with depressing ease, but it looks pretty!

I’ll be posting random thoughts across the weekend to make up for the lack on content on Thursday and Friday.