Topic: The Music Thread

@AgentCooper I used to write a little blog, mostly about gigs I went to as I went to a LOT while at uni in London.

Now, I find following certain labels really useful for keeping up with some new stuff I might have missed. For instance, Big Scary Monsters in the UK release loads of stuff I seem to like so I’ll often check out their new artists.

I also listen to the Radio 1 Rock Show and the Future Alternative playlist/show too and find loads of new stuff through them.

I’m also signed up for emails from Banquet and Drift record shops and find some stuff through them too.

I don’t stream anything though. I buy most stuff through bandcamp and then have two playlists on my phone; one with the most recent albums I’ve bought (with a one in, one out rule when I get something new) and a second that I rotate albums every week or two for ones I haven’t listened to for a while.

I was listening to The Ape of Naples by Coil and I can’t stop picturing this guy

@AgentCooper I've felt the same for many years. When I was a kid buying music on vinyl, cassettes etc felt really special. I knew it was something that I wanted to experience and would spend ages digesting the sleeve notes and religiously listening over and over again until I'd memorised the play order and names of all the tracks. Even now if I hear a song from those days I'll start humming what would be the next track on the album.

I still listen to music mostly as albums now but I struggle to even remember album names now let alone track names and play order. I guess I just listen to so much stuff and usually while I'm working that I just don't process it in that way anymore. I also have less memories memories associated with those songs so it's not as easy to file them in any meaningful way. I guess that's not just down to not buying physical music any more though but is generally because this midlife I'm in is more mundane than back when I was a kid 😅

@AgentCooper Reading my uncle’s royalties was pretty grim. You can basically put a lifetime into music and get pennies in return.

@AgentCooper He was part of that whole wave of British post-hardcore/math rock in the 00s alongside Johnny Foreigner, Los Campesinos etc. We used to wind him up and say he was Inbetweeners-core, as in the sort of band that would turn up in the Inbetweeners. Honestly though, got great memories of watching them play live on BBC 2 and it’s pretty cool that his music is forever immortalised in the soundtrack of FIFA 10. However, that doesn’t pay the bills! It just goes to show that you really do have to make it like proper big to have any chance of living off the royalties. Touring Japan, the States, Australia and stuff is a short term deal, you basically have to land a single or two that gets used constantly in TV shows or the radio.

I'm hoping this does not start a new craze of bagpipe renditions of classic hip hop tunes! 😂

I know a lot of people disregard anything Pulp before His n Hers but they still have some great tunes from the 80s. Really wish I could have justified tickets.

@Kidfried That’s incredibly short notice for tickets for somebody as big as her!

The Atmos mix of Suede’s debut is pretty cool. It always sounded incredibly fuzzy so it’s nice to hear it cleaned up a bit.

@Jimmer-jammer I'm glad you enjoyed it and welcome back. I've been gaming less myself so using the site less, yes, order and chaos is what jazz is all about. I've been listening to this guy, have you heard of him - Charlie Hunter? He has a 7 string guitar where the bottom strings are bass strings, custom-made, and plays bass & guitar melodies at the same time, you should be able to find some stuff on youtube.

Everything else has been good just finished a short course in counselling psychology, which I've been focusing on recently as I would prefer that to a literary career.

Everything well in your neck of the woods? What have you been listening to lately?

I've had this version of this son stuck in my head for ages, can't get enough of it

Probably doesn't help that I've got the blues brothers soundtrack in the CD changer in the car 😅

I've been listening to a lot of King Gnu lately. Some of their songs are absolute bangers - especially their song 'Ichizu'. It's been the first song on my Spotify playlist for a while now. The music video below is actually quite cool too.

There are some flashing/strobe lighting and effects in the video so I'll throw up an Epilepsy Warning just incase.

Poor Sinéad O’Connor. One hell of a life.

@Jimmer-jammer Did you listen to Charlie Hunter? How are you? Thoughts if you listened to him? What sort of orchestral works did you listen to? Wayne Shorter, who died recently in his nineties, wrote a jazz/classical piece called Emanon which I believe you can find on Youtube. I can post a link if you like, or it's on Spotify if you have that.

@nessisonett R.I.P Sinead O' Connor. As a lifelong fan of music as I'm sure you are, what is one or two genres from youth that you don't see yourself going back to? Mine would be rock and metal, since listening to jazz and hip hop almost exclusively for the last few years I just prefer a different type of vibe now, arguably you could say that rock and hip hop both have elements of aggression, but I say that in hip hop it's more about confidence, and you can pick up similar vibes in jazz that also exist in hip hop. People say jazz is the mother of hip hop. Anyway, over to you

@TheBrandedSwordsman Hmm, I kinda keep my options open in terms to genres and stuff. The sort of music that I won’t go out of my way to listen to (prog, a lot of metal) it’s the same stuff that I never really enjoyed growing up either.

@Kidfried The only YYYs album I own is the one from last year as they’re a band that kind of passed me by. The album Karen O did with Danger Mouse (Lux Prima) from a few years ago was pretty good too!

I haven’t been to a gig in so long but have one in a week I’m really looking forward to. Some great emo music from Hot Mulligan and Spanish Love Songs. Both released new albums this year with the latter only coming out this week. A bit more synthy than their other stuff but it’s growing on me.

@PixelDragon I love big festivals, went to a 4-day one this year - but while I still can endure camping at one just fine (did so last year), I'm glad we chose to stay at an airbnb this time
And even with that, my legs were near non-functional by the end of day 4 - but to be clear, when I go to a festival, I go to the festival. I will start with the very first band of the day and stay there till the end of the headlining show.

Also, Decapitated are one of the tightest live metal bands out there. Poland's always been pretty good in the extreme metal department (although these days it seems to have moved from death metal to black metal by a significant margin)

@Jimmer-jammer I thought I'd take the time to introduce you to another jazz titan; Sun Ra. He is no longer with us, unfortunately, but I am sure his music will always stand the test of time.

Hope you like it!

My Walkman’s belt has most likely died, it’s stopped spinning. Gutted, Apple Music’s trial ran out so I’ve literally been listening to music on tape cause I can stick my headphones in it. YouTube’s rubbish for streaming music with how many adverts you get now and it’s a little bit of a faff messing around with my turntable just to stick in my headphones. Maybe I need a Discman, CDs are cheap 😂