Podcasts - Part 2

After listening to some of the less professional podcasts I've got some new pet peeves. I now can't stand people saying 'I love this' or 'I hate that' or 'He's one of my favorite directors', 'That record is just shit' or  'You must like this....!' etc.

I get the kind of DIY thing that some of the podcast kids are going for, but sometimes the amateurish approach to their recording, equipment, research and articulation on their subjects leaves a lot to be desired and can be unlistenable. Here we continue our little squizz at the world of podcasting.

DAUGHTERS OF DARKNESS
This is probably the best podcast discovery of the year and it only kicked off in March. Samm Deighan and Kat Ellinger host this show on cult movies with equal amounts passion and knowledge. They present Daughters Of Darkness with great conviction and eloquence. This show is incredibly well researched and Samm and Kat have a delightful chemistry. So far they've covered Lesbian Vampire movies in a 3 part series. Then they brought us a a four part season on Polish director Andrzej Zulawski who recently passed away. Next they investigated the subterranean world of indie American exploitation films that featured in Stephen Thrower's top book Nightmare USA. There's plenty more too. This one is for the cinephiles and lets hope it continues with such high quality.

DIRECTOR'S CLUB
Another podcast dedicated to film and man there are a lot of them out there. This one's a bit too haphazard for my liking. It's a bit like overhearing a conversation in a bar about a film director. Perhaps that's what they're going for. It might be enjoyable to be in that conversation, not so much fun to listen to it.

STORIES THAT MATTER
This is an excellent podcast presented by The Peabody Awards. Great interviews with award winners Anthony Bourdain, Serial's Sarah Koenig, Documentarian Alex Gibney and Sopranos creator David Chase. This could have been one of the great podcasts in history as Matt Shedd is a fabulous interviewer but it came to an abrupt halt after just five shows.

ADAM BUXTON...
Supposedly this is a comedy podcast! It's remarkably unfunny despite the occasional interesting guest ie. John Ronson, Rob Brydon, Louis Theroux etc.

RICHARD HERRING'S LIECESTER THEATRE...
If you can get past the acquired taste of so called comedian Richard Herring you may well be able to enjoy some of these episodes. Sometimes I can't listen to him and other times I can tolerate him. As the title suggests his show is recorded in front of a live audience and he's had the cream of the comedy crop turn up for this podcast which ensures hilarity often. Comic legends such as David Mitchell, Stephen Fry, Ross Noble, Steve Coogan, Sarah Millican, Jessica Hynes, Lee Mack, Eddie Izzard and Vic Reeves have all graced the Leicester Theatre stage for these recordings. The two episodes that stand out have been when David Cross and Bob Mortimer were guests stars and in fine form. He's had his share of turds too ie. Russell Brand, Sue Perkins, Jake Whitehall etc.

BY THE WAY, IN CONVERSATION WITH JEFF GARLIN
Jeff Garlin of course plays Larry David's manager in the classic sitcom Curb Your Enthusiasm. The best podcast is the first one and it's with Larry David. This instalment is like an elongated scene between the two in an episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm, depending on your view of the show you'll either love it or not. The other episodes have been disappointing. He got a bit cringeworthy during the podcasts with Lena Dunham and Amy Poehler.

Mulligan and O'Hare!

Podcasts - Part 1

In 2016 I have mostly been unable to enjoy or even listen to music, much to the detriment of my blog. I put on normal TV for the first time in over 12 months this April only to discover Australian telly is just as shite as the last time I turned it on. I knew there was a reason I got got rid of cable a couple of years back. The free to air idiot box is even worse. The only 2 shows I've been able to enjoy are Gogglebox and Have You Been Paying Attention?, sometimes they even wear a bit thin. There are so many unfunny comedy shows, unlikable comedians, overtly crass witless characters, formulaic reality tv, terrible American tonight shows where the hosts have no craft (Fallon, Colbert & Corden all seem to be in the wrong format) and don't get me started on the ABC (Australian Broadcasting commission) let alone fucking ABC2. My love for Aussie Rules footy has waned and sports broadcasting seems to be at its lowest ebb (The Olympics) as well as being at saturation point. I didn't even fully engage with this years season of Girls, which has been the best show of the last few years.

In the search for something to fill a void for my natural curiosity (I've only been able to read one and a half books in 2016) I have tuned into the podcast world. Previously I have enjoyed The Ricky Gervais, Stuff You Should Know, Bret Easton Ellis, Finders Keepers Radio and No Such Thing As A Fish podcasts. I decided to go deeper this time. I've been checking out certain podcasts to see what the fuss is about and just came across others. Fuck there is some shite out there but a couple of gems have come to my attention. So here's a brief look at some of the casts of pod I have wrapped my ears around.

SERIAL
This is the one everyone talks about and it even won a Peabody award. Sarah Koenig and her cohorts excel with their 2 seasons. The first is 12+ episodes investigating a murder trial gone awry. The second is a bizarre 11 part story of an American soldier who goes AWOL in Afghanistan. Recommended.

WTF
Marc Maron presents interviews with an array of cultural figures. He's really bloody annoying and comes off awkward when talking to women. I don't think he's actually a comedian . Don't understand the popularity of this one. Wtf?

THE NERDIST
This is also quite annoying. The presenters (who call themselves comedians??) come across as so needy and desperate (also see above) while they interview people from current pop culture. Like Maron the interviews with women sometimes come across as awkward and even a bit creepy.

WORD
This one is a bunch of annoying British men who love the sound of their own voices and find themselves 'oh so interesting'. However there have been a couple of good episodes particularly the shows where excellent authors Pete Doggett and John Savage have been guests.

SOUND OPINIONS
This is a well researched and professional podcast about music presented by a couple of old rock crits from Chicago Jim DeRogatis and Greg Kot. It's a bit old hat but the old hat bits are the best bits. Slayer, Bob Dylan, Toni Visconti on Bowie, John Savage on punk, Sarah Marcus on Riot Grrrl, Jac Holzman on Electra Records and Stanley Booth on The Rolling Sones are amongst some of their choice episodes. Get your retro rock information fix here.

MY FAVORITE ALBUM
Jeremy Dylan has a guest on each episode talking about their fave LP. Records covered are usually of the canonical variety although Comsat Angels, The Shangri Las, The Blue Nile and Shuggie Otis have had episodes dedicated to them. Dylan does his research but many episodes depend on how eloquent his guests can be about the music they love. Bob Harris on Forever Changes, Stephen Tobolowski on Ziggy Stardust, Robyn Hitchcock on Plastic Ono Band and Bad Dreams on Unknown Pleasures are some of the highlights ......Oh and Dylan loves his Beatles, he could probably do a separate podcast on that little known group. This show is at its best when host and guest are just as engaged as each other by the LP being discussed.

SUPPORTING CHARACTERS
Bill Ackerman does a very good job presenting this show with a different guest each week discussing Horror/Genre/B-Movies etc. His guests include writers, exhibitors, bloggers, zine publishers and documentarians. He's had some of the best authors in the field featured on his podcast including Danny Peary, JA Kerswell, Kier-La Janisse and Daniel Bird. The highlight so far was episode 2 with guest Samm Deighan, she writes the excellent blog Satanic Pandemonium and has just started co-presenting the fabulous podcast Daughters Of Darkness (more on that next time). Supporting Characters is just 14 episodes in, making this a relatively new podcast on the block and he's setting the bar high. Recommended for film buffs and cult movie fans.

Kathleen's Hanna

D.W. Suite - Mac Bits II

Only came across D.W. Suite this week after watching an old episode of Northern Exposure, couldn't believe my ears! That opening minute fifteen, mmmm. DW stands for Dennis Wilson apparently. 

TIM'S ULTRA ROUGH GUIDE GUIDE TO ROCK - PART VII?

SUICIDE - SUICIDE

Neon lit psychotic synth punk biker boogie. This future has yet to arrive. Suicide were an entirely electronic duo. Martin Rev created one hell of a hypnotic, paranoid and insistent sound with just a broken farfisa and some homemade electronic effects. Lyric subject matter covered pop culture, love, sex, murder and the grim reality of urban/mental squalor. All this was sung by a reverbed to the max Alan Vega, who was an intergalactic rockabilly performance artist. Seminal.

Broken Hearts - Part 2

Loved this when I was little too. Children are strange. The teacher who did the 2 The Langley Schools Project LPs in the 70s said that the kids responded much more to the strange and emotional songs than the straight ahead pop tunes. 

Broken Hearts - Part 1

It's funny how songs like this appeal to you as a child. I guess it was like a portal into what adulthood intensity was going to be like. Little did we know how painful such things were going to be and that we never really wanted to go through a scenario such as the one outlined in this song. Great songwriting but if you look a little closer this is actually quite a disturbing tune. In there somewhere seems to be a suicide threat.

I loved this when I would have been 10. Quite possibly the greatest heartbreaking tune of them all. It's all too much! That voice too.

Mac Bits....

I loved this when it came out. I would have only been like 8 but it got played to death on the regional radio station of my childhood 3MA when I lived in Buronga. Of course I wouldn't have realised the Stevie Nicks connection. Maybe I thought it was Fleetwood Mac though, I mean it's co-produced by Lindsay Buckingham. I think I actually only learnt that a year or two back!

This was on a hits compilation (Chartbusters?) when I was like 10. I wouldn't have realised who he was until at least 5 years later. I remember my sister thinking he was a bit of alright. I dunno though, he's stacked on a few pounds and isn't as cool as he was during the Rumours/Tusk era or even circa The Dance. Is this a good tune? I have no idea. I can't get it out of my head though.

In Love With These Times: My Life With Flying Nun Records

Finally a book on Flying Nun written by the guy who started the label. Haven't read it yet. Here's a podcast from the other day with the author and a bunch of old film clips. Can't help but think this might be quite boring though, like that podcast. How sycophantic is that interviewer as well? Bruce Russell once hinted that Flying Nun's signings weren't necessarily based on aesthetics or great judgement but just whatever bands existed on the south island and other parts of NZ at the time. They were lucky there were so many good ones. This was further demonstrated in the late 80s when, after Flying Nun did some major label deal, a lot of the better acts started getting their work rejected. Anyway I hope it's good or do I?.........I wonder if the Axemen will get a mention?

I kind of liked it when you knew very little about underground music from NZ or Flying Nun. In the 80s I reckon there were only like 5 videos that ever got played on Rage. You'd see a small news article on The Clean or Verlaines in RAM back then plus the occasional review or bit on The Clean or The Chills in NME and Melody Maker. In Clinton Walker's 1983 (published in 84) book The Next Thing, which was about the current state of Australian rock, there was one paragraph at the end of the book mentioning The Clean, Victor Dimisich Band, The Chills and The Gordons. Walker speculated that perhaps there was something cool going on over there in the land of the long white cloud. He wasn't even sure if The Clean were still together! That's how little information there was at the time. Finding a Flying Nun record was like discovering treasure. Now all that fabulous mystique has gone and we're way too over informed more and more each day. I miss the mystery. I don't wanna know how much a Bats LP cost or how many copies they manufactured. It was all about these peculiarly beautiful tunes that seemed to come out of nowhere or maybe from a parallel time and universe. New Zealand seemed so mysterious and so far away then, even though it's just a short flight from East Coast Australia.

Robot/Copy - Plastics

1979 B side

A side
Released on Rough Trade.

The Dadacomputer

Again & Again &...

Whilst moving house recently a printed out image of the cover to this tape came out of one of my boxes. I'd printed it out a couple of years ago as I thought it was an incredible piece of pop art as previously mentioned. I'd only seen the cover and heard one of their tunes back then but a few months after that original post I found a cd in a second hand record shop in Melbourne. It was a little confusing though as it was credited to The Birth Of 5XOD. It was only like $6 so I bought it anyway. When I finally got home and did the interweb research I discovered it indeed was the same album Minimal Wave had reissued. I'd just never heard of 5XOD (or Five Times Of Dust) but I soon discovered they'd released 4 tapes in the early 80s and contained members Mark Philips and Robert Lawrence who were the original band Dadacomputer. Confused? Anyway it wasn't until blog Die or DIY? put up a file of 5XOD in 2014 that I ever heard them. Last year Johnny Zchivago of the aforementioned blog put up a whole lot of stuff from Mark Philips, Robert Lawrence and other associates of The Dadacomputer/5XOD and fuck that was like an avalanche of revelation. 

Getting back to the original Dadacomputer tape from1981, it has since become a cult classic at my home, on the internet, amongst electro fiends and.....er... hipsters and continues to grow in stature by the minute. So much so that a tune from the tape has been included on the 4 CD compilation of UK electronic music from 1975 -1984 Close To The Noise Floor. In fact it's the first track on that collection, as if the compiler was trying to make a statement about the merits of the band. There's also a tune from 5XOD included as well. Anyway The Dadacomputer tape is a classic of it's ilk. The primitive melodic electronics are like an unholy union created in the interzone of Computer World and 20 Jazz Funk Greats except it is fabulously unique. Which makes that description kind of deceptive. The contents range from computer-y disco to proto-house to trippy journeys into sound to minimal pre-IDM through to the just plain weird/normal. The Dadacomputer are neglected alien space babies lost inside el cheapo computers from 1981. On the surface it seems sonically rudimentary but on closer inspection it is perhaps sophisticated. Had enough paradoxes, oxymorons, confusion etc? Well I'll stop there.

Eventually I'll do a post on Map 7 which is an epic 10 tape series by Map (ie. Mark Philips 1/2 of The Dadacomputer) from 1981 because it is awesome.