Lists.......

Ok I was gettin a Sunday burger and chips with the Mrs today and there in the magazine racks for your perusal was another fuckin' list. This time it was The Rolling Stone top 50 alternative records of the 90s and I'm pretty sure it was you know the Australian version. What kind of Australian version has 3 Australian records in its top 50??? What does alternative mean and who gives a crap?! Anyway I've got list fatigue suffice to say no Rowland S, Dave G, Nick C, Spiderbait, The Moles, The Church, The Chills, The 3Ds, Kim Salmon etc.....I've got list fatigue and can't waste any more energy on complaining that twits run magazines and fuck knows who buys them! Even bigger twits I suspect. You am I turned up of course they obviously like chugging! Anyway my burger was fantastic mustard and pickles with like home made chips with a touch of salt and rosemary. Yum! Well worth it. The Mrs had a lovely satay & coriander burger, apparently v nice. Will be making return visit for sure. I'll bring my own reading materials though next time, I don't need to get angry/bored at Sunday lunch.

DISCLAIMER:
Not actual burger that I ate but v similar looking

Rolling Stone Australia what a fucking joke!

London Retromania!

The Arctic Monkeys at the Olympics doin' one of their own songs which was about 10 years old. Then there was the singer's look kinda Teddyboy/Beatles in Hamburg and why didn't they get Paul McCartney to play bass on their version of The Beatles Come Together? The Beatles Hamburg look though was long gone by the time the Beatles recorded Come Together, so The Monkeys were fucking with the temporality of things. Weird. Most recent song was a Dizzee Rascal track from 2009 and it was actually him singing it. There was some horrible thing with strange choreography set to British music through the 60s to now well 2009. They did a weird mash up with like The Who, Stones, Sex Pistols?, The Kinks, Bowie, Fuckn Blur, The Jam, Frankie Goes To Hollywood, Eurithmics?, Soul II Soul, Prodigy, Underworld, Sugababes, Adele, New Order all just records then Dizzee  actually came out and sang live with an old track Bonkers. Does London have anything new to offer? Is the future over? The present doesn't even exist!! Oh and there was Mr Bean.???? Is it still 2009 in London?

Blur

Tip for young players see picture below. Alex James ???????!!!!!!!!!!!!.

Mature Themes Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti

So I think they have or are going to release Baby as the first single. Disappointingly it's not Tina Turner on backing vocal but an impersonator. I liked not knowing and having that fantasy of Tina and Ariel gettin down and dirty in some seedy studio in LA.  Baby is a fuckn great song and may even get airplay. It's a cover apparently. Anyway I was listening to the album again and thought 'What else could be a single?' Only In My Dreams has already been a free download. The catchiest song on the record and really should be the next single in the perfect world would be Symphony of The Nymph. That is a classic pop song but I just can't see it gettin commercial airplay with mentions of lesbians, nymphomaniacs, colonoscopies  and Ariel referring to himself as a lesbian, a MILF or a Nymph or whatever...... We live in a sad world if this cannot be a hit! But you never know Lou's Walk On The Wild Side was a hit. Katy Perry can kiss a girl and we liked it. Fingers crossed!

Just another normal night in with Ariel

Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti

Here's the only track off the new LP that I can find on the youtubes, it reminds me a little of The Go-Betweens well instrumentally anyway because nobody sings like Ariel does. Just listening to the album again and is it Tina Turner on Baby? I'm thinking now these tracks could've been recorded anywhere between The Doldrums and Before Today. It's more upfront in it's new waviness ie. not swathed in so much hiss or noise but also not as overtly Hi-Fi or reverby as Before Today.

*What I meant by it not being his In Utero (Nirvana's follow up to Nevermind) is that he wasn't trying to go back to street cred/noncommercial roots due to a loss of nerve ala Cobain Stylee. You know second guessing himself and all that and being torn between mainstream and indie culture. I don't think Before Today sold that many units for Ariel to be having such an artistic/existential dilemma of this kind. It was probably good in the end that it wasn't his Nevermind (Before Today that is) now.

*And what I meant by it not being Ariel's Dirty (SYs 2nd major label LP) Sonic Youth's follow up to Goo their first  LP for a major label. On Dirty is where Sonic Youth went off with budgets and production and everything. They went OTT and it was a brilliant move but a hard one to come back from. I think at the time time Thurston was calling it their Aerosmith LP. They had the opportunity to make a massive budget album so they just said why the fuck not?! Ariel going way more Hi-Fi would have been good too or ending up with something like a Tusk (Fleetwood Mac's follow up to the multi-platinum Rumours) which was great but weird and well Mr Pink already ticks those boxes.

*I had this whole theory a couple of years ago now that Before Today was his Nevermind. But instead of him pilfering from ten years of the whole of the American underground you know Flipper, Husker Du, Sonic Youth, Wipers, Mission of Burma, Black Flag, Scratch Acid, Big Black, Dinosaur Jnr, Meat Puppets, UK Post Punk and Metal, that Ariel Just pilfered from his own 10 years (at least) of underground activities as he really was the only happening thing in the US in the 00s bar a couple of misc. artists. I really thought that's what Before Today was his very own Nevermind. You know a cleaned up radio friendly version of the past 10 years for the masses to consume in vast quantities. Then when he was on Jimmy Fallon I thought yeah he's gonna do it! It was weird after like 8 or 9 records that all of a sudden someone was willing to throw money at him. He was nearly forgotten then all these acolytes turned up, swarms of them, and putting out good records as well (just before the signing/recording of Before Today). I had all these other parallels that I can't remember now something about gender issues Rape Me/Menopause Man similarities, the effeminate, being a female identified male heterosexual........... was the gist of it. So maybe it was happening in reverse-now there's going to be ten years of other groups underground activities inspired by A.Pink (we'd already be in our 4th or 5th year anyhow) I don't know how many units he shifted of his last LP. I suppose he got halfway......well probably not even that far. You know what they say in showbiz 'better to be lukewarm than hot.' He's always been hot with me but you know what I mean?

There were even image parallels. That's Ariel not Kurt!

*When I said his other classic 8 I meant from The Doldrums onwards including Oddities Sodomies Vol 1. & The Holy Shit EP. Haunted Graffiti 1:Underground is good but it's not in the same league as the rest.

Night Of The Wolverine - Dave Graney & The Coral Snakes

GLARING OMISSIONS IV

Mr Graney was going to be Glaring Omission #V and a certain Sydney via Canberra band was supposed to be #IV anyway whatever. I just had to double check The Age's Top 50 Australian albums list because I cannot believe this record and/or some of his others are not included. This is the LP I'm most surprised didn't make it into either list. You Know feedtime and The Primitive Calculators are not that commercial so they weren't surprises just overlooked gems. Less is More by fucking Even gets a guernsey in The Age 50 over this? In that freakin' book Baby fuckin Animals get an entry over this iconic Melbourne via Mt Gambier, Adelaide, London etc. singer/songwriter and his team of crack musicians. Maybe Dave was right that he was the invisible rock singer hiding in full view that everyone just took him for granted. I mean this guy was King of Pop, won ARIAs and shit and uh oh... he had a great fucking personality. This is Australia Bland Please!

The Moodists
Couldn't find pic from
the book with Mick Turner

Robert ford on stage look

So I was a country boy (boy was I country) and I must have been in about year 8 or 9 when I discovered the school library and they had some Rock books, you know, like the encyclopedia of rock with Jagger on the cover etc. There were a couple of Aussie ones as well and the one I flogged (no security buzzers in those days) was The Next Thing: Contemporary Australian Rock by C.Walker. It became my ozrock bible and I still have it to this day, school stamps throughout, contacted and with a Dewey no. 780 (was that Dewey for ozrock) WAL. Anyway it was this photo of the band The Moodists that just stayed with me. They looked so normal maybe even a bit daggy, this was the 80s the time of Real Life and Pseudo Echo and at the other end of the spectrum punky/goth shit. Yeah they were like dressed down way before grunge. This book was from 1984. I mean Mick Turner in this photo in the book was wearing the same clothes I was wearing. Dave was wearing something quite unique though.  Anyway I don't think I heard the band until they'd broken up. I have this tape, can't recall where it came from possibly a friend or a friend of a friend or an op shop I dunno. It's a Sony HF90 containing 3 Moodists classics Engine Shudder, Moodists & Thirsty's Calling. I'm listening to it right now and it's in fine condition. I prefer it to the CD compilation which came out in the 00s, things in the right place know what I mean? The Moodists were good at kinda building momentum from their  minimal repetitions that tended to swirl into some kind of intensity. Sometimes they had pop songs though didn't they? Influenced by the Velvets, The Stooges, The Birthday Party, PIL and maybe even Flipper. Some tunes are similar to other artists at the time Like The Gun Club, Dream Syndicate and maybe even The Triffids at their roughest.

Then it was this film clip on Rage (Australian all Night Music show), in around 1990, Robert Ford on Stage where Dave had a twirly mo and a beard. He looked like something out of Deadwood. This was very very strange at the time. Now walking through Northcote can be a bit like the set of Deadwood. I was showing my friends and my little sister the clip saying 'how fuckin great is this song?!' People couldn't get past the image, you know, they didn't look like the Stone Roses. I still love that song. By the time I was living in Melbourne in 1991 he was back from London I think and sometimes I could go and see him for free. Wasn't this guy a legend? I was seeing him for free on a week night at The Espy. Also up in the old piano bar at the Prince Of Wales, I loved that place. By 92 there were some records finally floating around and he was gettin played on the radio finally. He was really finally becoming a Melbourne cult thing. Everyone loved him.

The cover I originally had.

I guess what happened next was a little unexpected. In 1993 he had a top 40 hit with You're Just Too Hip Baby a beautifully soft and funky Doors influenced tune. Then the fabulous LP Night of The Wolverine was unleashed onto the public. JJJ had the single in their end of year top 100 and he was nominated for best alternative release at the ARIAs for the album. The LP is fuckn great from start to finish. Tracks like Mogambo, I Held The Cool Breeze, 3 Dead Passengers in A Stolen 2nd Ford, Maggie Cassidy, You Need To Suffer, I Remember You etc are all classics. Not one dud on the whole record! His songwriting was peaking and the band, man they were cookin. Beer, Scotch, death, cows, movie stars, country, city, Beat poets, cars, loneliness, dwellings, drunkenness, Grace Kelly, Jazz in 1950s Paris, Ava Gardner, Dope, Football, Serge Gainsbourg, Clarke Gable, outlaws and even the Beatles, it was all here and much more. Clare Moore on percussion, vocals and drums, Rod Hayward on guitar, Robin Cassinader on keys and other stuff and Andrew Picouleau on bass. Tex Perkins guesting on the centrepiece of the album Night of the Wolverine 2 which was in 3 parts and was 8 and a half minutes of pure pop heaven. This was a group recorded at an absolute peak of their powers. It's hard to desrcribe the music an almost Euro/Hotel Lobby Band/AOR/MOR feel with some kinda acoustic Australiana/Hollywood/Beatnik vibe played by the best band in the country who you felt could do anything and possibly would. It had an air of timeless sophistication and it was addictive as hell. That record's been played hundreds of times by me and I love it more each time I hear it. The melodies, the words, the band, the backing vocals, the arrangements......so cool!

I guess he also introduced me to some cultural icons like Serge Gainsbourg and now one of my favourite actors Warren Oates. After reading his terrific book 1001 Australian Nights I thought I'll have to dig out those CDs My Life On The Plains, Night Of the Wolverine, Soft & Sexy Sound but they were gone (too many share houses, robberies etc.). So he is one of the few artists I have bought their same record twice (rare company indeed only Beefheart, My Bloody Valentine and Roxy Music are in this category). Still can't find the first couple of records anywhere though. I'm not an E bay type of human yet. Other Graney records also could have made it here and certainly would be in my Aussie 100 list like The Soft & Sexy Sound, Hashish, Knock Yourself Out, We Wuz Curious etc. I am also diggin on the new one You've been On My Mind!

The cover of my 2nd copy.

   *I used a Dave Graney tongue ie. 'I was a country boy (boy was I country)'

 **There was a Coral Snakes tongue throughout the entire post actually.
***Interview with Clare more here at messandnoise

So long Blogs...

Two more blogs have disappeared without trace Know Your Conjurer which was a bewdy and Stolen Lynx which was pretty self explanatory. Gone! Is it the FBI or somebody else spoiling the fun? I think perhaps an Internet era is starting to end well I guess it started earlier this year when they nabbed the Megaupload guy in his bunker in the Antipodes. What ever happened with him anyway?

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!

Stereeolab/Ariel Pink

I just noticed on the blogosphere some group claiming Stereolab to be a big influence on their new LP wow was I ahead of my time by 10 seconds or what? Well I didn't mean it. I'm not sure of the move here with Ariel, this new LP could have been recorded anywhere between House Arrest & Worn Copy really. It's neither his In Utero nor his Dirty. There are no coordinates with Mr Pink and who needs em. I'm loving this great new LP as much as the other great 8. Particularly Nostradamus & Me, Schnitzel Boogie, Symphony of The Nymph and Farewell American Primitive er......and the rest.

Ariel Pink/Gary War

Just scored these two it's like fucking Christmas! Let's hope it's a good Christmas. Very Excitement!

Gary War's new LP! I loved his previous one and this years

collaboration as Human Teenager. Cant wait to hear this!

Jared's Lot is its title

Mature Themes is the most anticipated LP in living memory, probably since Before Today (for me anyhow). 3/4 of the way through my first listen it sounds very good. Perhaps not as Hi-Fi as Before Today and on some tracks his vocals are quite upfront. Can he do it? Can he top the best LP of 2010s?.....er.....that being the one he released before this one. I've gotta get up early but now I'm too excited. How old am I? Is that Tina Turner guesting on the last track Baby? I think he Ariel and his Haunted Graffiti have done it again.