Testcard

Think Inside The Box

This came in via an email and I’m glad I followed the link- nice uptempo, funky house from veteran German producer Boris Dlugosch and Joe Goddard with some very silky vocals exhorting people to abandon social media and step together. I especially like being advised to ‘think inside the box’- let’s have more jargon busting songs please.

For the first time ever, I have not exceeded my Boxnet bandwidth this month. Small achievements are still achievements. Either I’ve posted stuff people don’t want or I’ve made far greater use of Soundcloud.

The Return Of Friday Night Is Rockabilly Night 110

I haven’t got any tattoos- never seen one I really liked enough to make me want to get it done. I’m not saying I don’t like them, I just never got the bug. Plus, when I were a lad, they were very much an outsider thing. You wouldn’t have one done in a visible place if you ever wanted gainful employment. hence, they were very much an outsider thing. I was never that much an outsider. Now, everyone has one, all over the place. Overexposed and from top to bottom. I was once in a busy swimming pool with my kids and I think we were the only  three people in the water without tattoos. A much younger colleague has her niece and nephew’s names on her the tops of her feet. On a school trip she asked if I ever thought about having my kids names tattooed on me, to which I replied ‘Nope. I can remember my kid’s names.’ Also, having them scrawled on my inner forearms won’t make them mean any more to me. But occasionally a proper 50s style rockabilly tattoo can be appealing.

Tonight’s Friday night song is a real swinging, bluesy rockabilly song from Jimmy Dempsey in 1960. he woke up this morning and she done moved- gone, left, skidaddled, real gone.

Think I might go for a pint.

She Done Moved

The Mekons

George, a regular commenter and Friday night rockabilly enthusiast has been having a clear out and found a book he thought I might be interested in- I was- so he sent it to me. Isn’t the internet great? These connections we make sat in our homes with like minded souls around the globe (Glasgow in George’s case). The book is a collection of paintings and thoughts of Jon Langford, founder and foremost man of The Mekons. Jon Langford came from Wales and went to study art at Leeds University just as punk hit the provinces. Armed with some art criticism, some Marxist ideology, friendship with Gang Of Four and a complete inability to play their instruments The Mekons made the classic debut single Never Been In A Riot. A later version of The Mekons made country-punk, fired up by the real attitude of old country ‘n’ western, hard-living songs about love, loss, death, drinking and smoking. They toured the world in the 1980s leaving a trail of fiddles and guitars behind them and a small army of followers.

Where Were You is one of my favourite Mekons songs but I don’t seem to have it on the hard drive any more. I do have this one…

Hello Cruel World

I’ve long liked this one, Memphis Egypt, about the redemptive power of rock ‘n’ roll…

The Strange Art

Today I have withdrawn my labour in protest against Michael Gove and his plans to further alienate the teaching profession. The Secretary of State for Education seems to have the view that teachers are the enemy and that the education system must be destroyed. Unfortunately striking will achieve precisely nothing- but when asked to strike I believe we should.

I don’t know who FK Club are but this song/remix package is ace, in an Asphodells and A Love From Outer Space vein. The original mix is fairly full on, drums and an up-in-the-mix hi hat, an insistent piano riff, a bassline like a rubber band being repeatedly twanged just inches from your earhole, nicely repetitive. Of the remixes Richard Sen’s is the one for me, adding bongos and a new, whopping great big bassline, although the others are no slouches. The In Flagrante one is a free download, the rest were released on vinyl a little while ago.

Never There When You Want Me

Andrew Weatherall and Timothy J Fairplay’s Asphodells album has been remixed by various folk and is due for release this September. So far Record Shop Day saw a cracking 12″ single with remixes by Wooden Shjips and Daniel Avery, a Justin Robertson  Deadstock 33s remix of Beglammered was aired on Weatherall’s last 6 Mix radio show, Ivan Smagghe’s doing One Minute’s Silence and there’s a Mugwump remix of A Love From Outer Space up on Youtube which I posted here on Lord Sabre’s birthday (April 6th). This one by Sean Johnston’s Hardway Bros has been up at Soundcloud for a while…

I’m hoping that the whole Ruled By Passion, Destroyed By Lust album will have been remixed by someone or other, and that the remixed lp will be sequenced in the order that they appear on the original. But maybe that’s just me.

Jeepers Creepers

You might have thought that by 1988 Siouxsie and The Banshees were past their best but this No. 16 hit would suggest otherwise. There’s still some good ole gothic melodrama and sexiness combined some genuine pop and a nod to late 80s hip hop as well. And an ascending and descending accordion riff that carries the whole thing along with Gallic flair. Peek-A-Boo began life as a B-side based around a John Cale sample but soon turned into a potential A-side and took a year to record, partly due to Siouxsie singing each line through a different mic.

Peek-A-Boo

The video is dead late 80s…

Dubhouse

This Hollie Cook and Prince Fatty cover version has got everything needed to make a great little dubby reggae song- snaking melodica, dub bass, some echo, sound effects and a lovely vocal. All the boxes ticked. I could listen to this all day.

You Know I’m No Good

Hang My Head

I’ve long had a soft spot for the recorded output of Pete Molinari, who I think I first discovered via his Billy Childish connections (Chatham, first album recorded in a day in Billy’s kitchen). Then with a single off his second album, Sweet Louise, which I love to bits. So imagine my excitement when I read some time ago that Pete had recorded some songs with Andrew Weatherall- the song above is produced and mixed by him, and features guitar by Little Barrie from Little Barrie and Primal Scream. I’ve just listened to this for the first time (despite it being on Youtube since January- well publicised then) and think it bodes well for the soon to be released fourth lp Theosophy. He’s contributed a song to the new Lone Ranger film too. Pete also spent part of an evening once a few years back chatting my sister up. Don’t think he got anywhere.

Dub Fi Gwan

This King Tubby track is what dub should sound like (to my ears anyhow). Tubby mixing it live at the desk, The Aggrovators supplying the tick-ticka-tick-ticka-tick rhythm and excerpts of dub-a-dub-dub-dub bass with some spacey FX and phased guitar chords.  One of the first dub tracks I ever heard (via the Blood and Fire comp King Tubby: Evolution of Dub 1975-1979, essential). Out of this world.

Dub Fi Gwan