The Afterword

Musings on the byways of popular culture

Menu

the awful music of our partners

by 42 Comments

Over the years, I have received thoroughly unfair criticism from various girlfriends for the exquisite good taste and occasional ironic retro moment that is my musical collection. And what were they playing?

Gilli Smythe. Elkie brook’s dullest years (most of ’em). Enya. “Star wars” soundtracks. Julian Lennon. 1980s Jefferson Starship albums. Tracey Chapman. UB40 after 1981. Vanessa Paradise. Norah Jones … and the non-shitter “Berlin” above – a mock-Goth confection that makes Hazel o’Connor look like Alien Sex Fiend. No wonder I would rather have a wife who likes classical music. That way we have different magisteria, so no comparison is really acceptable (given the humiliation with “Close to the Edge” on the other page).

Your ungallant exposure of the hateful musical taste of ex’s here. This is a gender and sexual-orientation neutral scorning here, so offence given to men, women, same sex-partners (etc.) is all welcome.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qrFCzKlMf6U

Lets face it, “difficult” music is often rubbish

by 46 Comments

I’ve been listening to a lot of downloaded old John Peel shows recently (thank you, “The Perfumed Garden”). Amidst the decent stuff is FAR too much pissing around with shouting and doomy chords, “mock” totalitarian rhythms, self-consciously discordant composition, etc. I am now far too old for this (like “modern” art, it is often rather old hat). I’d rather have tunes, melodies, nice sentiments and leave the sixth-form/ Art school foundation year behind. OOAA, but they are wrong.

I know it’s not one or the other, but give me Laura Nyro over “This Heat” any day.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jRhAtCjPGcM

The Internet of Things

by 18 Comments

I’m all for the intelligent use of technology to make the world a better place. Gimmicky crap (wi-fi hairbrushes?) not so much. Given what a pain in the jacksy computers can be when they are hacked/ virused/ are updated/ etc., having them overseeing your toilet, taps, and front door (and you paying for these to work) seems a bad move to me, unless it it is necessary due to disability issues. Smells of “selling shit to fickle rubes” to me.

https://twitter.com/internetofshit

When a single track compromises a faultless run

by 46 Comments

I was listening to a 4-CD Stevie Wonder history today. All going fine – even the odd track from “The Secret Lives of Plants” – when the frigging “I just called to say i love you” popped up. This lousy track eclipses (as it were) the foregoing due to it’s ubiquity and crapness. Other utterly shit tracks that are turds in the musical swimming pol are Yes’s “Wondrous Stories”, and Genesis’s “Afterglow”. Other tracks that ruin quality runs?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QwOU3bnuU0k

They’ve gone too far now

by 27 Comments

The suicide bomber at Ansbach was refused entry to the open air concert as he didn’t have a ticket. It’s a common form of discrimination, this pay-for-ticket rule. He had a bomb with nails and shrapnel in it, which is somewhat different to the usual festival kit of spare bog roll, cagoul, pork pies, and a bifter in one’s sock. The shocking news is that the mighty ‘Tull were playing. Western culture is now truly under threat.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Df9hatTZu24

Q – was it funny?

by 17 Comments

I can’t find that brilliant picture of spike milligan and a member of his cast dressed as super heros smiling at the camera, one of them being a spitting image of Tom watson. What WAS the name of that actor?

Watching a Q compilation on YouTube yesterday, I couldn’t decide if it was the most unfunny thing ever, or a fascinating insight into Spike Milligan’s broken mind. But his cast in it were brilliant, which makes me think we should see it as Pinter/ Beckett rather than “are you being served”.

So what smartarse will refer to the rocktastic 80s/90s read which was once not so bad?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3KyE8UMSxI8

Had to be said

by 31 Comments

While I very much for the robust questioning of politicians, I must admit that this bit of vox-pop to “man of the people” Eddie Izzard did make me feel warm n’fuzzy. He is the kiss of death for many a cause, and I am not convinced his posturing is likely to impress poor people struggling in Redcar (who I care about far more than rich celebs wanting to continue being fabulous). The referendum seems to me to have been quite good at shaking up politics and political attitudes such that tribal voting is being undermined on all sides: not before time, IMHO. I wonder if these shifts will maintain post 24th June? I wouldn’t mind if they did.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcRAN4bgZjs

https://www.dissentmagazine.org/online_articles/left-case-brexit

Improving an album

by 120 Comments

I am sure this has been discussed before, but what creative edits and mergings will improve an album no end?

I found that by editing “Moby Dick” so it becomes a meaty riff, a drum beat, then the outro meaty riff radically improved Led Zeppelin II.

You also have massive dividends by putting sides 1 of Todd Rundgren’s Utopia – “Intiation” and “Faithful” on one disc, losing “A treatise on Cosmic Fire” (not the same without psychedelics) and his “Faithful” covers.

I prefer “Wish You were Here” with all parts of “Shine On..” as one long track.

OOAA. Are there other creative edits out there to improve one’s listening pleasure.

It is my sad duty to inform you … RIP Philthy Phil (drummer with Motorhead)

by 9 Comments

Metal became a bit tired in the late 70s. What it needed was a bit of a speedy lift, and by golly they got it with the emergence of Motorhead. Prissy critics of ‘rockism’ could thereafter GTF. It needed the right sort of drummer – one who would be fast, loud, and hit the buggers. Being a bit of a rock n’roll character helped, too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YVlxCA6lRKY

http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/photo-of-motorhead-phil-philthy-animal-taylor-backstage-at-news-photo/86121890/gallery http://www.blabbermouth.net/news/former-motorhead-drummer-phil-philthy-animal-taylor-dies-at-61/

King Crimson

by 13 Comments

Venue:

Brighton Dome

Date: 05/09/2015

The big one: King Crimson plus heavy friends in a sold-out Dome. Light-prog fans were at the conference centre grooving to the Australian Dave (excuse me, David) Gilmour Show hearing and watching what sounded like the same heritage Floyd show. Fripp had collated 3 drummers (one doubling on keyboards), Tony Levin, Mel Collins, and Jakko Jakszyk, and while there were plenty of old tracks (three from “The Court of the Crimson King”, “Larks Tongues in Aspic”, “Easy Money”, “Red”, etc.), some these had not been played sometimes for 40-plus years. Minimal lighting, minimal amplification (but astonishing sound), and advice to sit back and just go with the music meant this felt a more adult event, and not just a re-living of smoke-filled afternoons in late-adolescent bedrooms. Intense, complicated music the way King Crimson fans like it flowed over the crowd, somewhere between heavy metal, chamber music, and psychedelic -progressive music. Two hours passed in minutes though Fripp had minimal engagement with the audience.

The audience:

What do you think? Men of a certain age, blokes who looked like my accountant, many fathers and sons (saving long-suffering wives from a night of pain), and Tommy » Continue Reading.

The joys of ageing eyes

by Leave a Comment

“I live my life by “The Ruts” – almost a truth for me for 6 months till Todd Rundgren took their place – is how my eyes, failing to adapt to bifocals, read the more prosaic AW thread “I live my life by this rule”. But it led me to this gem, so serendipity still works!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NxHpn0xlgcc

What did the NME know?

by 42 Comments

The NME provided good curatorship of music and popular culture for the first 10 years of my musical development (1972-1982). There was no YouTube, albums were expensive when you got 75p pocket money, and so the local music library helped me to discover, for example, old blues artists name-dropped in the mag. The ‘year zero tendencies’ of the punk years sometimes threw out the baby with the bathwater, but the year end charts and poll-winners generally showed the power of the group. Into the 80s, the tapes kept ears open, but the posturing, pushing, and politics led to some right bollocks, IMHO. “Birdland” as the future of rock n’roll? German metal bashing? (We had perfectly good British metal bashing in Test Dept).

Chris Squire seriously ill

by 16 Comments

Chris Squire, has been diagnosed with Acute Erythroid Leukemia (AEL), an uncommon form of Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML). He will be treated near his home in Phoenix. AML has an unattractive prognosis. Send progressive love.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b94ndAHFHaY http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m9hj67eDyR1qkd7h4o1_500.jpg

For the more broad-minded AWer.

by 3 Comments

I have a student examining attitudes of men to the various kinds of sex workers out there. So whether you have or haven’t engaged in this sort of thing, please contribute to this study. Please share the link on your own FaceBook pages and other networks; this will optimise the chance of our recruiting a representative sample of chaps.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WPcIR7zCPPM

https://nottingham.onlinesurveys.ac.uk/attitudes-sex-workers-services