moseleymoles on The Last of Us – let’s post more gaming reviews

Not being either 17 or a professional games reviewer, it takes rather longer for us middle-aged gamers to post our thoughts on today’s consoles/pc games than on the latest Steven Wilson album. Not so much a Night In as six months of snatched half-hours in my case. Yet games importance in modern culture – easily the equal of Hollywood and perhaps more important than music if you are under forty – should see them feature on The Afterword more. I guess I am saying that those of us who do game should try and post our reviews more regularly, even if we are only now catching up with GTA V. Admins – any chance of a separate category in Nights In. Happy to suggest what the categories should be.

If it took Bingo Little some time to play Bloodborne, it’s taken me far longer to play through what was universally agreed to be 2014’s Game of the Year – The Last of Us.

This is not a game based on a franchise or a sequel. I think that there’s less wider interest in posting a review of » Continue Reading.

Raymond on Thinking about how we ought to talk about a difficult topic

Such is the degraded nature of our national discourse on the topic of immigration that I feel obliged to start this piece with a statement, or -in modern parlance- a trigger warning.

I am a free-marketeer. I believe that capitalism, while far from perfect, provides the greatest good for the greatest number. I believe this because all of the available evidence leads me to that conclusion. Further, that belief in the free market comes with a belief in the free movement of people, which means that I am in favour of immigration, including economic migration.

(read more in comments)

Raymond on How not to write a song for Shania Twain

A few years ago, I was asked to provide some material for an up-and-coming young female country singer. A friend in the business who was familiar with my writing style (I was going to use the phrase ‘writing prowess’ there, but that would have been a bit of an exaggeration) thought that I might have some songs which -given the right treatment- could have worked for this particular vocalist. My name was passed to the singer’s manager, who also happened to be her mother. After a perfunctory phone call (“I’ve been told you write songs. We’re looking for songs”), an appointment was made for us to meet. I packed my guitar and notebook and drove out to a big house in the country, about a mile and half from the middle of nowhere.

(the rest of this article will hopefully follow below)

Raymond on Some advice on how to curate your tragic music collection

A few weeks ago, I got involved in a conversation with some friends about what to do with our old vinyl and CD collections, the assumption being that -in the digital age- nobody really wanted to keep hard copies of anything anymore. I begged to differ, because I’m one of those sad folk who does want to keep hard copies. I like having products to hold, look at, read, smell and –most of all- file. It is a truth universally acknowledged that a man in possession of a sizable music collection will have to devise an efficient filing system. CDs, for instance, should always be displayed in alphabetical order, preferably in the room in which you do your listening. Unfortunately, I don’t have that luxury for my own collection, which resides in the living room, wherein other members my family are to be found, usually watching something they call ‘the television’. Due to some legal mumbo-jumbo that I don’t understand, I am not allowed into this room without giving written notice, but at least I know that when I fancy listening to an old CD, my meticulously-curated display » Continue Reading.

moseleymoles on A brief note about the liner note

If the mp3 sounded the death knell for the Liner Note, the era of streaming has well and truly nailed the coffin down and shovelled the earth over. The idea that there might be some writing alongside the track(s) seems a positively antediluvian notion. So, before its gravestone mosses over, let’s offer a brief thought for the humble Liner Note.

The first records had no truck with writing either. Instead the record sleeve was valuable billboard real estate that could be used to shift other catalogue items, the record player to play your new disc on, or other stuff entirely. This notion lived on into the early eighties in the ‘Nice Price’ range, when the inner sleeve showed you how you could add most of the Alan Parsons Project back catalogue to your collection at a speical low price.

The liner note started as an extension of advertising copy – written by the admen at the label to persuade you to take it home as you stood there staring at the back of the album in the record shop. Here’s the note for the first Bob Dylan album:

Columbia records is » Continue Reading.

Colin H on Quintessence

I see a yawning chasm marked ‘Features’ that needs to be populated. Here’s a piece I wrote on Quintessence which appeared last year in ‘Record Collector’…

Quintessence

Some bands struggle for years for attention, but not Quintessence. Within weeks of forming, in April 1969, they were a word of mouth sensation. Chris Blackwell and Muff Winwood of Island Records dropped into a rehearsal with a chequebook and an artistic-freedom guarantee. Sorted. Quintessence were huge on the European live scene for three years and, in retrospect, were the last great hurrah of ‘the sixties’. By mid 1972, after four albums and two singles, the original six members had split in two – recording one more album each, as Quintessence and Kala respectively, before all involved slipped into obscurity as swiftly as they had appeared.

Quintessence, like Hawkwind, Marc Bolan and the Third Ear Band, were a product of London’s Ladbroke Grove scene, but few were locals.

Ron ‘Raja Ram’ Rothfield, an Australian conservatoire and jazz trained flautist, had met American bassist Richard ‘Shambhu Babaji’ Vaughan in Greece, both moving to London in 1968. Phil ‘Shiva’ Jones, also Australian, had recorded downunder as Phil Jones & » Continue Reading.