What are you listening to right now?

[Bad Ambassador]

Wonderful record.

[BlueChair]

Who knew that a relatively young duo from Nashville could deliver such beautiful bossa nova? Highly recommended. You can see the video for the title track here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1qXwGWlDHXY

[Mr. Average]

[Otis Westinghouse]

That isn't hell.

[Otis Westinghouse]

Read a glowing review of her new covers LP Jukebox and it made me run back to this, especially as I had 'Where Is My Love?' on my mind. 'Lived In Bars' never fails to get me. Same backing band on the new one. Worth getting for that alone. Like the cover:


"Today we announce the final sequence for Cat Power’s upcoming ‘Jukebox’ album, to be released on January 22. The names below indicate the best known performer of the original songs, who are not necessarily the songwriters:

1. New York (Frank Sinatra)
2. Ramblin’ (Wo)man (Hank Williams)
3. Metal Heart (Cat Power *)
4. Silver Stallion (The Highwaymen)
5. Aretha, Sing One For Me (George Jackson)
6. Lost Someone (James Brown)
7. Lord, Help The Poor And Needy (Jessie Mae Hemphill)
8. I Believe In You (Bob Dylan)
9. Song To Bobby (Cat Power **)
10. Don’t Explain (Billie Holiday)
11. Woman Left Lonely (Janis Joplin)
12. Blue (Joni Mitchell)

* original version on the ‘Moon Pix’ album
** first appearance of this song

In addition, there will be a limited-edition silver foil deluxe package with a bonus disc containing the following 5 songs:

1. I Feel (Hot Boys)
2. Naked, If I Want To (Moby Grape)
3. Breathless (Nick Cave)
4. Angelitos Negros (Roberta Flack)
5. She’s Got You (Patsy Cline)"

The original announcement of the tracklisting included Dark End of the Street, sadly omitted. The Word also regrets the non-inclusion of Gnarls Barkley's Crzy, which apparently has been a live staple of late, slowed down. Worth checking Dime for that, I'd say.

[verbal gymnastics]

Radio 1 Established 1967 - Various

Some interesting versions of songs over the last 40 years. It opens with Kasabian singing The Move's Flowers In The Rain (which everyone knows was the first song played on Radio 1).

[mood swung]

awesome photo, awesomer record.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6pT-IsIb0U

I ain't quite got the youtube thing figured out.

[Who Shot Sam?]

Tradesmen cleared out for the day, so I broke out the vinyl version and cranked it up - sounding terrific. A brief respite before I have to go collect the kids and it sounds a heck of a lot better than that bloody wet saw I've been listening to all day!

[Mike Boom]

The best VU album, free of Nico's whining , with the killer "What Goes On" and the wonderous "Pale Blue Eyes" .

[Who Shot Sam?]

An absolutely superb set of Beethoven's orchestral works - symphonies, all of the concertos and overtures, for a bargain price. Anyone wanting to buy the symphonies and concertos with modern recording technology all in one swoop could not find a better alternative. Terrific interpretations - really taut and gripping, as Beethoven should be...

[verbal gymnastics]

Wild Wood - Paul Weller (the 2CD reissue).

I am loving his version of Oh Happy Day. Just what you need whilst you're driving along and it is absolutely bucketing down with rain.

[Who Shot Sam?]

Really fantastic. Best thing he's done in a very long time IMO - probably since Tom Joad.

[Who Shot Sam?]

Once again. Fantastic album by an unjustly neglected band...

[pophead2k]

Really fantastic. Best thing he's done in a very long time IMO - probably since Tom Joad.

I really agree. I keep coming back to this album.

[Otis Westinghouse]

Nice depiction of the taste on this board. Agree that the second is VU's best in some ways, but not in terms of stunning ground-breakingness. I revere the first more than anything else they did, though I love Nico too. the story of how Lou bullied her into endless retakes so she dropped the Germanic sternness and went for something soft and vulnerable on I'll Be Your Mirror sums it up. I love that performance, and Femme Fatale. And I adore Sunday Morning. And of course Heroin is incredible. I guess they are the one band from my teen music-fanatic years who I haven't followed up on CD. I played them non-stop as a sixth former and undergraduate. I must redress this. I'm Beginning To See The Light, Jesus, the two you mention - so many classics.

WSS: is the Harnoncourt newish? Is it all symphonies? All the piano concertos? How many CDs? I've spent the last few years not really focussing on classical music, after doing the opposite throughout large chunks of the 80s and 90s, and I'm enjoying refocussing now.

I'm listening to the latest and typically excellent The Word sampler:
http://www.wordmagazine.co.uk/content/n ... cd-its-way
The opening item is British Sea Power, a song called Canvey Island, all about flooding and a football team in 1953 - no doubt drawing parallels with the floods last year:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/date ... 749771.stm
Not sure where the footie team come into it. I was keen to hear as the LP is getting good reviews - all about recent British history, etc. A friend tells me they're cracking live. I love this song - it's quiet to loud in the manner of much current stuff, but it has a scale and drama about it that is striking. And I like the voice and the line 'This is really happening'. The LP, out tomorrow, could be well worth checking out. Also interesting is a Joe Jackson song, Too Tough. I have a love/hate thing for him, partly cos he comes across as such an arrogant self-important twat in interviews, but also as he never seemed original enough. This is nice, though. It's a descendant of the style of some of his earlier stuff, but nicely matured.

[Who Shot Sam?]

WSS: is the Harnoncourt newish? Is it all symphonies? All the piano concertos? How many CDs? I've spent the last few years not really focussing on classical music, after doing the opposite throughout large chunks of the 80s and 90s, and I'm enjoying refocussing now.

Yes. Well, recorded throughout the 1990s. The symphony recordings first, then the concertos and Missa Solemnis. Great value if you want a lot of great Beethoven for under $100 - it's essentially all of his orchestral music in great sound, and in the right spirit.

[johnfoyle]

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Achtung-German- ... 102&sr=8-6

Achtung German Grooves
~ Various Artists

I'm grooving my socks of to this , especially 'Es Steht Ein Haus In New Orleans ', Orchester Gunter Gollasch's 1969 version of 'The House Of The Rising Sun'. True the guitar sound is stolen straight from the 'Stones '2000 Light Years From Home ' but the shimmering intro will just floor you.

[bambooneedle]

Nils Lofgren - Shine Silently

& some Southside Johnny & The Asbury Jukes

[Otis Westinghouse]

I'm grooving my socks of to this , especially 'Es Steht Ein Haus In New Orleans ', Orchester Gunter Gollasch's 1969 version of 'The House Of The Rising Sun'. True the guitar sound is stolen straight from the 'Stones '2000 Light Years From Home ' but the shimmering intro will just floor you.

Checked the snippet on the link and it does sound pretty damn groovy.

[BlueChair]

Like The Kinks, The Byrds are known best for their early singles - but some of their albums are quite good. This is their final album before the original lineup reunited for one more album, The Byrds. The only original Byrd here is Roger McGuinn and at this point he was pretty generous about sharing vocal and songwriting duties with the rest of the band. The rest of the lineup consists of Gene Parsons (no relation to Gram), Clarence White and Skip Battin. Some great rootsy stuff on here. Clarence White is an underrated guitar genius.

[Otis Westinghouse]

I used to listen to REM's New Adventures in Hi-Fi a lot in the 90s. Mood's Song Title Game ref to Be Mine made me check it out again You Tube, and then New Test Leper, and now a great live version of Country Feedback, with lovely Peter Buck solo ('Peter Buck - how about that?'). Great songs all.

[Otis Westinghouse]

Just to comment more on the above, it's curious that Stipe changes the song's climactic line from 'It's crazy what you could have had' to 'It's crazy what she could have had'. Why, Michael?


A fellow Fall fan friend sent me this. BWAP: do you have? If not, you must. Mouse on Mars - two German electroheads - team up with the mighty MES. It actually sounds great. Mark has rejected the LCD Soundsystem comparisons, but there's definitely some common ground. I think the electrobeats really suit Mark's voice. Like LCD, it gives a sense of a current sound and something that harks back to the classic post-punk and 80s era. Me like.

[Who Shot Sam?]

Blasting from my daughter's room...



Got this for the wife as one of her b-day presents and she had been listening to it with my daughter when they were cleaning up her room last night.

[Otis Westinghouse]

Any good? She appears to be losing her eyes under a sea of make-up.

Early Fall, '77-'79. Got this out the local library today. I'd seen it there a couple of weeks ago, went to get it last week, and no sign. Looked again today. Returned. Who in my area is checking out the earliest Fall recordings? The funny thing is I know nearly all the songs on this brilliant CD, yet don't have any of them on CD. I was sure some would be on the Peel sessions box set, but no, nor on BWAP's splendid Fall compilation, nor anywhere else. I must have taped several of the songs off Peel, as I found that I knew pretty well every word of Bingo Master's Breakout and one or two others. Of course I have the immortal Rowche Rumble and Fiery Jack on 45rpm, and it also contains the two excellent songs that were on Short Circuit: Live at the Electric Circus, Stepping Out and Last Orders, which I also have on vinyl (contains Joy Division's very early At A Later Date). I love the sound of the band then, in many ways my favourite era of John Peel's favourite band.

BWAP, if you're reading this, do you have these songs? Details here. Will gladly send you a copy if not.

After playing this, flipped on Russell Brand on the radio, and straight up was Gang of Four's Damaged Goods. Wow what a song. Hadn't heard it in years. Sounded better than ever. Blimey there was so much great stuff around when I was 15...

[Who Shot Sam?]

Any good? She appears to be losing her eyes under a sea of make-up.

Yeah, not bad at all. I've always liked her voice.