B Is For Black Affair

Steve Mason’s 2009 side project Black Affair was an 80s electro inspired project, which was great in small doses but wore a bit over the course of an entire lp. Still, in a field of his own is Steve Mason- most people wouldn’t record let alone release an album like this, so far removed from what he’s known for. This was one of the highlights.

Sweet

In a slightly belated tribute to United’s 20th league title our picture shows Bobby Charlton, presumably in the aftermath of the Munich air disaster or an early anniversary of, with a cracking quiff. Bobby was present as a player for United’s 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th league titles and he’s still there, although he doesn’t make the netting bulge anymore. The Premier League is a million miles from this picture. Yesterday’s post-Beta Band group The Aliens had a song called Bobby’s Song which I should’ve posted instead really.

I Thought You Were Usually Dennis Law, Sir?

‘I’m Bobby Charlton, it’s too cold to play as a striker today’.

I’ve more or less given up with unsolicited music submissions from bands emailing me looking for some (admittedly limited) publicity. I can’t keep up with music I choose to listen to never mind anything else. But this popped into my Inbox the other day and caught my eye.

‘Hi Swiss Adam,
I’m Mark Wynn, a spoken, word, noise, man/boy from York. My latest album, “Eggs,  Kes

and that bike I never bought you even though that I would like to’ is set to be released

on Desert Mine Music in mid February. In a recent review by NineHertz.co.uk I was described

as being “Like a young John Cooper Clarke but less angry and more Half Man Half Biscuit.”

On his Bandcamp page Mark says this about the album…

This is a collection of song noise things I made in December 2012 January 2013. Some of them are true things and some of them I just overheard and wrote down in public places so I’m not sure if they’re true… not sure that it really matters… 

Mark’s songs are endearingly ramshackle: acoustic guitars, clapping, occasional snatches of feedback, never less than interesting lyrics, some rapid fire delivery, some very Northern English references, and some sharp observations about modern life that’ll make your ears prick up. And getting Kes on dvd in HMV in exchange for a cd he got for Christmas he didn’t want, a dvd he’ll probably watch only once. You can get the album as a download (pay what you want, free if you like) here. You may as well eh? I like it, you should too.

>Meetings With Footballers 1

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I’m not sure exactly when this photo was taken, sometime around the 70s turning into the 80s. That’s me in the middle and my younger brother Z on the left. The gent on the right is Manchester United legend Bobby Charlton. A building society in Didsbury, M20, launched itself on a Saturday morning with a promotion where if you opened an account with them (minimum deposit, one whole pound) you got your picture taken with Bobby. So, me and Z trooped up the road from Withington to Didsbury, not quite believing the actual Bobby Charlton would be there, and opened our accounts. The photo turned up a few days later, signed by Bobby. Z still has the photo in his possession. It’s worth noting that out of the three people in the picture Bobby is the one who looks most now like he did then. I wish I could still get my hair to look like it did then.

Radio 4 is the final track on Public Image Ltd’s barnstorming 1979 Metal Box lp, the flood gate opener for post-punk. After four sides of Wobble’s dub basslines, Levene’s scraping guitar, the skittering rhythms and Lydon’s caterwauling, Radio 4 was a moment of beauty and respite- drumless, synthchords, virtual strings, post-punk classical. Probably the only thing on the record Bobby Charlton could listen to.

Radio 4