Rowland S Howard Lane

It's real. Rowland S Howard got a Laneway in St Kilda, Melbourne, Victoria named after him. I no longer reside in Melbourne so thanks to Darcy B for the picture.

I died first. Where my bloody laneway?!!!

Rowland was of course in a little band The Birthday Party with another bloke called Nick Cave. Now when's Tracey Pew getting his laneway, I wonder? Howard played guitar, occasionally sang and wrote some of the songs on the below classics.

PRAYERS ON FIRE - THE BIRTHDAY PARTY (1981)
The Birthday Party at their best. Here they were still a little bit arty and very funky. They were traversing the depths of depravity though. When I think of this album I think of Tracey Pew's bass, which is just plain filthy, pure sleaze. Then there are snippets of lyrics like 'Fats Domino on the radio.' Sung by a pained Nick Cave as is 'Ice cream and jelly and a punch in the belly.' Then we've got the clang of Rowland's mental guitar that is actually meant to sound like that. Prayers On Fire is an unholy racket and absurd fun for all the family.

JUNKYARD - THE BIRTHDAY PARTY (1982)
This is The Birthday Party at their most raucous and psychotically over the top. Junkyard is ferociously chaotic from go to woe. The noise reaches fever pitch on tunes like Dead Joe, Blast Off and Big Jesus Trash Can. This cacophony is some of the most uncompromising rock ever produced. Sex and death roll around in this putrid blues. The Birthday Party may have inspired a legion of z grade imitators but no one could match their intense sonic assault.

*My mini reviews taken from here.
**More on Rowland here and here and here and The Birthday Party here.

Strange Collaborations

Well I've been noticing in the last few months some strange musical collaborations happening but this one has gotta take the cake - Scott Walker & Sunn O))). I mean I love me Scott Walker and we all know he's a little strange and a little cheeky but what? I think it's as strange as the pairing of Lou Reed & Metallica, no definitely stranger. I must admit I haven't listened to that and some people rated it quite highly? I mean I'm big on Lou and have been known to enjoy Metallica amongst friends ie. I never bought a Metallica LP in my life but my friends did and I didn't hate them. It's a bit like Sunn O))). I enjoy what I've heard on the radio but never bothered to investigate them any further (It's been in the back of my mind to check em out....but....). Maybe not quite as strange but Royksopp & Robyn? Now I can't think of the other ones that I've seen and thought what? Maybe though its a better collaboration if you are stylistically further from one another. Nick Cave & Kylie Minogue was superficially a bit weird but if you think about it they are both pop singers, entertainers, song and dance people. Now Kylie & Stockhausen would have been weird but probably not as weird as Cave & Stockhausen, at least Kylie would be considered electronic rather than rock. Now this all reminds me of French musique concrete composer Pierre Henry collaborating with British proggers Spooky Tooth, a bit weird?. Kate Bush & Peter Gabriel normal. Nirvana & William S Boroughs a bit strange but not really. 

Coldplay & U2, now that'd be fucked up! Only one band would have to turn up. Would you have The Edge from Coldplay or U2's Edge? What about Taylor Swift & Burzum? Pharell & Earth? Evan Dando & Diamanda Galas? That one kinda sounds like it might be alright, it's hard to know. Nickleback & The Wiggles? The Mrs offers Allanis Morrisette & Coldplay. You could play this game all day really and somebody probably already has on Twitter. Then there's the whole alive/dead thing. Nicki Minaj & Ian Curtis anyone up for that? What about Kermit The Frog & Townes Van Zandt? Elvis & Bieber?

True Detective Trax

Very surprised to hear this tune at the end of a True Detective episode. They don't make em like this anymore and actually they hardly made them like this at all. Sludgy psychedelia. My old band used to do a cover of this but we couldn't match this vibe one bit. Untouchable and bloody weird and bloody great.

Then there was this at the end of episode 4 and it fitted perfectly with the intense mayhem that had just occurred on screen. It made me remember how excellent Grinderman really are/were? I think what gave Grinderman their fresh new edge and the the feeling of it being a separate entity from The Bad Seeds was that it was Nick Cave's first time playing guitar (I think) on a record. They were like a brand new band despite containing four Bad Seeds members.

Loved hearing this one at the end of episode 7. I'm not really sure of its thematic connection but who cares? This is the great classic version of Lungs from his Townes Van Zandt LP from 1969. It doesn't get much better than this!

The music person on the show must have had fun putting these tunes on the show, well in the end credits actually. Funnily enough I can't stand the theme tune. It's like some z grade attempt at a Nancy & Lee song. What was this band thinking 'Our contribution to music is going to be a way lesser version of a classic duo, that's the best we can do.' Well you know what don't bloody bother, we don't need to hear it! They could have got, I dunno, Mick Harvey and Anita Lane to do the theme or just use an original Nancy & Lee track. Willie Nelson & Dolly Parton, how good what that have been? 13th Floor Elevators' Kingdom of Heaven would have done just fine. Aren't there a bunch of great musicians from Louisiana they could have used? Kevin Gates and Lil Boosie in the rap world and I'm sure there's some great folk/country musicians! Anyway it was great hear these three classics in the finest show of 2014 and one of the greatest shows on the telly ever.

Led Zeppelin IV - Eric Davis

I finally read this book in the 33 1/3 series after hearing those Zep trax in the films Argo and Silver Linings Playbook. Surprisingly I got through a book of 170 pages written about 1 LP. Surprising as my favourite template for LP reviews is Greil Marcus's appendix to Stranded. The appendix is basically 2 sentence reviews of hundreds of records that didn't make into the main body of the text. He once noted he loved doing that but perhaps prior knowledge was required to fully understand them. Considering we're in the age of info-overload this seems like a perfectly valid way to analyse Albums today. The kind of information in a normal media review is usually padded out with this type of background/prior knowledge anyway, so who needs another one. Every time Nick Cave puts out a record I have to wade through his immense history, usually in the Sunday supplements, before we get to the few words about his new LP. This has got to the point where I just scan to the new info or sometimes I just give up all together. So Eric Davis you've done well to get me through your 170 pages. Admittedly I didn't know that much about Led Zeppelin, their history and what they were on about.

I don't need to say anything about Led Zeppelin IV except I cant believe how much I enjoy it. For a large part of my life they were the enemy, everything worth hating about rock. This stance of course was residue from the punk/post-punk/new pop eras. I guess this all started to erode in the late 80s. I was very confused when Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth in a Juke magazine (Aussie equivalent of NME, MM & Sounds) article said he was re buying old Led Zep LPs. I think though I started to cross the line when I could no longer deny how fucking great Jane's Addiction were and bought their classic Ritual De Lo habitual. Some how I could put it down to their mix of Zep rock and post-punk/hardcore/pop flavas. I was yet to be convinced that you could listen to a Zeppelin LP in all seriousness though.

I didn't really like the more trad Zep influenced bands like Soundgarden etc so it was ok. My Phobia & denial continued despite kinda digging the Dazed & Confused film clip which was frequently played on Rage from the late 80s onward. 6 or 7 years ago I thought 'if i can be massively into the first 4 Black Sabbath albums surely I can let go of my Led Zeppelin prejudice. They must be bloody good'. In a record shop I found II, III, IV and Houses of the Holy for 5 bucks each. II was the one for a couple of years. Then III & IV took my fancy then the levee broke and it was all over. I was finally emancipated from the narrow minded anti dinosaur dogma.

Who Listens To The Radio?

That's what I'd like know. Well today it was me. Dave Graney & Elizabeth McCarthy's show Banana Lounge Broadcasting. It was great to listen to a radio show again. Many years ago in a job I could listen all day and I loved it. I knew when all different shows were on different stations every day. I miss it. First of all I learnt a lot from the adds er..sorry sponsorship announcements. Mick Taylor, Elvis Costello, The Sunnyboys, Nick Cave, Jo Jo Zep all doing the heritage touring circuit. That might be a little unfair to Nick but the rest you know what I mean. The most exciting touring news though was that Leon from Curb Your Enthusiasm is doing a stand up gig. I'm gonna have to get ticket. Then there was a terrific interview with The Pretty Things. They talked about the early days of art school with members of the Stones. New to me was their porn alias group Electric Banana recording for a library records company. I'd love to hear those. When talking about the old days of not having drums miked up reminded me of a time with my short lived  group. After the mixer spent half an hour on setting them up, she was then told by the proprietor to unmike them. Needless to say there was animosity in the room which eventually turned it into an enraged gig possibly our best. Side note: Why do the mixers get all the money?  Anyway back to the radio show. The guys from Pretty Things were a great couple of geezers and well they finally made it to Australia. This interview may end up on a podcast check the 3RRR FM website as it's well worth a listen for any 60s music fan. It was good to hear a new track from Paul Kelly, a tune by The Meters I'd not heard and even some MJ! I should listen to more radio and be less dependant on the Internet. Now I'm gonna get out some old blues.

 

 

 

 

Scott Walker: Prevaricator.

Enigmatic? You think?

In a recent interview by Mike Barnes with Scott Walker I read today Scott admitted being prone to prevarication. I thought I've never heard that word ever in my entire life and I've read some lofty shit and communicated with many users of unnecessary words just because they can. What was once called a showoff, you know before building ones self-esteem was invented. Now it'd be oh aren't you a clever little thing using such big words.  Anyway I looked it up and it means 'One who walks crookedly.' & 'One who departs from duty.' Now this could be taken as an oblique way of saying he's still quite hedonistic (although somewhere else in the article he said he doesn't drink as much as he used to) or just lazy when it comes to work. Or Both. I know that he is quite a keen traveller. He doesn't give much away and nor should he. Who cares what he does in his private life. Or is it part of some sort of mystique building?  I doubt it as he comes across as an affable and private gentleman. He's quite funny too as you would imagine because some of his songs are hilarious.

The above video was mentioned in that article. Wow it's dated badly or has it? Listen to it a couple of times. This could have been a subversive hit. In another dimension this is being played on Classic Trax FM. I love it. How about that quintessential 80s lead break! Now that's funny. In career overviews they always leave out a track he sang on the soundtrack of the Film To Have & To Hold directed by John Hillcoat.  Ironically it was written by Bob Dylan.

The Arrangement was done by Barry Adamson and produced by Bargeld, Jones, Harvey & Cave. I remember it being better. It must have been a thrill for those guys to work with Scott as I'm sure they are huge fans. Strange that this was recorded around the same time as Tilt. He is a massive film buff so I'm sure that's why why he did it. Not that it's bad but his head was in a totally different space for Tilt. Maybe this was the aforementioned producers projecting their version of Scott onto Scott & somehow they convinced him/got away with it.

Couldn't resist this great picture of the original
existential hipster heartthrob.

Bow Ties/Fashion Retromania

They were never comin back ever and hello every tool under 25 & actually over (hello host of The voice) has got one. Another clear example of the last thing you would have expected to be in fashion and then bang it  happens! People should hire me as a some kind of  consultant!

Tracey Pew Bass

I Haven't read the new Wire issue yet on bass but I thought I'd put my Tuppence worth in anyway. Immediately what sprang to mind was Tracy Pew of The Boys Next Door/The Birthday Party. There's a reason why he's on the cover of that HITS compilation because he was the heart and soul of the band. He drove them and without him on bass they would have been nowhere and nowhere near as fucking great!

The first one I love is The Friend Catcher particularly when the guitar/clarinet/sax(?) end up following his bassline every now and then. I could post entire LPs but I'll spare you. Mr Clarinet and Happy Birthday are much tighter and clipped but no less effective. A Catholic Skin is so good for the most part it is just one bass note propelling the song forward. Hats On Wrong is a much looser Pew and an indication of what was to come, geez he was good.

Then there's The Red Clock where Rowland S Howard does the old Ozzy Osbourne trick of following his vocal melody with whatever Toni Iommi guitar is playing (or was it the other way around?), except with Rowland's vocals it's to Pew's bass.

King Ink is possibly Tracey Pew's finest moment of bass glory. It's just so fucking grimey, muck is pouring from his fingertips. Human Skin and electricity fusing for a pure expression of filth. How does he keep playing that bassline amongst the rest of the shitstorm that is going down in this song.

Zoo Music Girl's bassline is just dirty funky fun for all the family. I could go on. Tracey Pew's bass on Nick The Stripper and Figure of fun are killer. 

Lastly there's Yard off Prayers On Fire. This is fucking incredible. Pew plays the bluesiest and most lonesome bass I've ever heard in my life. I think it's the only time he ever played double bass on a Birthday Party record.                                                                            

The Wire magazine. What happened?

1993 was the year. Melody Maker and NME had been slowly starting to shit me from like 91 onwards. There was still good stuff happening over at Melody Maker at this time but it was starting to diminish. Maybe my tastes were changing too.......anyway The Wire was good because it was covering interesting (ie not this weeks fashionable pop group) stuff the weeklies were starting to ignore and they didn't have that kneejerk criticism/create a new scene every other week/backlash the next week blah blah... of the weeklies which was incredibly liberating at the time. The Boredoms, West African Tapes, Edgar Froese, Miles Davis, King Tubby, Mouse On Mars, Gamelan, High Rise, Method Man, Casper Brotzmann, AMM, Jungle, Tricky, Eddie Palmieri, Ambient, Thinking Fellers Union Local 282, Gunter Muller, Omni Trio, Prog Rock, Nirvana all rubbing shoulders together. This seemed quite rad at the time and perhaps it was. We might be a bit used to it all now in this post everything world. So for many years it was an essential read. All through the 90s it was great, but somewhere in the 00s it became less essential. I guess it didn't matter that much as music criticism on the blogosphere was peaking at this stage. Who needed to buy a magazine made of paper? How archaic!

In the last couple of years it seems to have picked up a bit though and there was always something to make you still at least check every month if there was something good in there. A Simon Reynolds article will get me in every time. Recently they covered Turkish Psych which maybe they usually would have done 10 years earlier when modern Turkish groups like Replikas and BaBa Zulu were making an impact on western audiences. Are they starting to repeat themselves? Scott Walker and Kraut/Kosmiche articles recently which were both covered extensively 15 years earlier. Old school NME narrow mindedness/bitchiness also seems to have kicked in as well as substandard journos who've got no fucking idea.

Nick Cave cops some knee jerk turds criticism for some of the greatest lyrics ever written.

An excerpt from Palaces of Montezuma by Grinderman

Psychedelic invocations of Mata Hari at the station 

A custard coloured dream of Ali McGraw and Steve McQueen

The spinal cord of JFK wrapped in Marilyn Monroe's negligee 

So Nina Power you look like a fool. In the same issue from September 2010 Nina's colleague Sam Davies calls electronic pioneer Bruce Haack dull. Guess what Sam you're fucking dull. Bruce Haack was a brilliant pioneer. Sam what did you pioneer? Being a dull music journalist pretending you've got something to say but really only being a try hard. Guess what Sammy that's been done before too. Tedious slagging was never part of The Wire thing so this is disappointing. Don't get me wrong I love a good slagging when it's smart, funny and justified. Mr Abusing/Agreeable anyone? Then they pulled the ultimate NME move in slagging a genre/movement they invented or at least identified and named ie Hypnogogic Pop. Time to move on I guess.....Simon Reynolds has an article in the bloody new one though.....

  

Separations

I've never been a completist. The Pixies and early 90's Mercury Rev were probably my most complete collections. I collected all the singles and extra bits of Mercury Rev's first few years but then they released a rarities record Lego My Ego. So what was the point if they were just gonna show up neatly collected at a later date anyway. The Pixies LPs plus the B Sides collection (what was the point of collecting all those 12"s)  is all you need innit? You could maybe chuck in a live record but do you really need it? So I still don't have The Purple Tape but one day I'll see it and go great and get it and go I can't believe I never had this.......So what I'm saying is I don't mind having holes in my record collection, in fact I'm kinda proud of it. It's probably healthy too.......you know less obsessive. Has anyone ever listened to that triple CD set of Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds' b sides and rarities in its entirety? I actually pulled out of a purchase of that one, put it back on the shelf. The Smiths are probs my favourite British group ever but I don't have the complete discography. At the moment I don't own a copy of Meat Is Murder. I had it once but I never thought it was any good. Was it poorly produced? Bad songs?.......can't really remember. Anyway since it disappeared (several robberies, ex girlfriends, friends, sharefucking houses-take your pick) many years ago I haven't bothered to get it again. Maybe I should get it...........

Anyway the reason I'm bangin' on about this is because I bought Pulp's Separations this week and I'd never heard it in full ever before. Now Pulp were probably my favourite British pop band of the 90s and I'd had all their 90s records one way or another but never this one. Had the CD of His n Hers, had a taped off a friend copy of Different Class on tape, an ex had Intro, had a VHS of The Park Is Mine, I burnt a copy of We Love Life from the library blah blah blah.............Anyway Separations is fabulous, can't believe I never had it for all these years. This is the record where it all started to gel. You could still hear hints of Gainsbourg, Ferry, Walker and Cohen but with added disco and sexy monologues a la Hayes/White. This is where Pulp become Pulp. On their following records you wouldn't spot an influence-it was just Pulp. It's hearing the moment of a band coming together and hitting on something great. So thanks to Owen Hatherley who wrote the previously mentioned (on this blog) Uncommon. This fantastic book has sent me on this path. Uncommon is about the records of Pulp and the world contained therein. Not a tedious biography interviewing Jarvis' next door neighbour from when he was in Infants 3 (er.....that's grade 3. The Mrs is Welsh) or Russell Senior's mum's best friend before he was born etc.......

 

Blur V Oasis

The winner was always Pulp.

Miserable/Funny Songwriters

I was going to bang on about New Zealand music and why the 80s to about 91-92 were a golden era etc. and not just the popular Flying Nun bands but the weirder ones plus xpressway etc.  Another time perhaps or maybe look elsewhere on the net for such information.  I remember a pretty good article on Flying Nun at the Stylus Website. There is also a good doco on the youtubes about Flying Nun Records.  Popwatch fanzine once had a terrific piece on the xpressway label. 

I was thinkin' about funny singers and songwriters.  It used to be, people would say 'Nick Cave was a bit dour.' and not see the funny side in the 80s into 90s, but now he's almost a fully fledged comedian so people are comin' round to the idea.  There also used to be "How can you listen to The Smiths? They just moan!" Of course as soon as anyone said this you knew that they hadn't truly listened to the band.  Morrissey was fucking hilarious!  Those Smiths albums still make me laugh.  Leonard Cohen too, what a laugh he was. Then there was the more obvious funny dudes like Robert Forster, Mark E Smith and Dave Graney. As well as hardcore like Flipper and Angry Samoans.

I had another category as well where it all seemed so serious surely they were havin' a laugh.  Maybe they were, maybe they weren't.  It didn't matter to me I thought they were a laugh a minute.  First example being Swans.  The darkness, the impotence, the serious delivery, the sickness etc. what a hoot!  Michael Gira possibly the funniest man on the planet.  Jarboe a bit funny too.  Joy Division were funny.  Add in Ian Curtis's dancing you got yourself a good time.  Primitive Calculators were great fun to me and my little sister when I was in my early teens.  Still one of the good time bands for me.  It turns out in recent interviews that indeed they had great senses of humour.  Einsturzende Neubauten with their crumbling architecture, wanting the world to end, the harshness, the screaming the mental illness etc. all good comedy fare.  Liabach, pretty funny as well.  Rollins too but I had to love the music as well so I don't know if he counts.

Funny songwriter or just a funny guy?

Anyway the whole reason I was thinkin' about this was because I was listening to The Drones for the first time in years and wondering where Gareth Liddiard fitted into this.  Sure on the telly he's a funny guy (RockQuiz a couple of times) but do I find his songs funny? I'm still not sure.  Steve Kilbey a recently hilarious dude was something nobody saw coming, well not from The Church's music anyway.  He might have always been a private card but I like the idea of him flowering late with his comedic prowess.  Gettin' loose in his old age.

Maybe all of this says more about me than anything else. Who knows?  Any thoughts out there ?


**That's a great painting of Gareth Liddiard (from The Drones)  from last years Archibald Prize Exhibition, which I managed to catch in The Yarra Valley.  That painting was also one of the strongest in the competition.