RIP GENE BARRY

Little picture, big actor.

Burke's Law, The Name of The Game, the definitive version of "War of The Worlds": all a big part of my childhood.

RIP, fella.

ON THE PURSUIT OF "VISAGE" BY LUCIANO BERIO

Is it possible, I'm wondering - is it actually fucking possible - to own too many vinyl versions of Berio's "Visage"...?

How many is enough? How many is too much?

It's the laughs that get me - the hisses and the snorrrks; the sighs and the unwords; the trills n the throbs. It's an incredibly sexual piece.

Sexy, but hysterical. I should've included it in my Ontological Hysteria Mix a while back. Maybe I did.

But how many versions are there? How many editions, performances?

CDs don't count, NaxosKids. And click-trawling the internet for copies like Woebot is just a cop out - this is a tale of deferred pleasure (and pain) - the story of a desperate sirensongcry that has echoed out down thru the decades; the ultimate electronic cocktease.

That wailing voice just, y'know, begging for it...

No, you need to pound some serious pavement, sniff it out in obscure Welsh charity-shops or Norfolk village fetes. It's there still, waiting for you. But you need to work at it. Put some effort in.

Don't tell my wife, but I've, uh, paid for it in the past and I... I'm not ashamed. The least was 50p; the most was £1.99. I don't live in London, suckers.

Years will go by between catching sight of this record in the raw, but it's never far from your mind, is it? C'mon, 'fess up; you're amongst friends here. It's just a piece of music.

I first heard it in '72? '73? A 'progressive' music-teacher (he had biiig lambchop side-burns) gave us pencils and a sheet of paper and told us to "draw what we saw in our heads" while he played it to us. My God, what was he thinking of, doing that to a bunch of pre-pubescent boys? (Maybe he had papers to mark or was nursing a hangover, I dunno) But, boy, did I ever draw!!

Then, at Yeovil College, my Stockhausen n Berio-jonesin' pal Dave Furber played me a copy and I thought waitaminute this sounds kinda familiar...my balls had dropped by that point and, ummmm, this was a woman's voice that spoke to me down thru the ages (very loudly and shrill-ly) of need and frustration, of want and desire. It was funny, sexy and horrible, all at once. Like a Lynch movie.

Somehow Berio had made a piece of viral music. He had invoked some sort of Endless Eternal Need, had awoken sexcircuits in our heads...

And you - you want it now too, don't you? My God, you want it so badly.

But just how long are you willing to wait?

How much are you prepared to pay?

How much is too much?

How much do you need, baby?

J-LO'S NEW POOL

McRAWLIX OVERLAY

JACK ROSE TRIBUTE BROADCAST

Some more music for ya:

A rather nice "Tribute to Jack Rose" Broadcast from WFMU 91.1. via Wire man Derek: @derekwalmsley

"Rather nice" - gah, could I get any more twee-ly 'English'? I'll be writing fucking poetry next. In blue biro on my arm.

Deduct -10 Bourgeois Points!

Still, cool mix. My kids like it.

SCULPTURE LIVE

Sculpture, recorded live at Bad Timing, The Portland, Cambridge, UK: 30/11/2009 via @tapebox.

A tape/drone/wonkcrete cut-up party. Lovely stuff!

LISTLESS: THERE IS NO ALBUM OF THE DECADE

Me, over on Loki's blog, talking about why I don't - can't! - have an Album of the Decade.

Haven't posted on Idiot's Guide To Dreaming for a while, but it makes sense to post this piece there for a whole daft raft o'reasons. One is because Nick and Loki had already started a quasi-thread there, but - mostly - well, sometimes it's just good to be amongst your friends.

I'm still pretty uncomfortable talking about some of the bad shit that happened to me in the early part of the 00s - it feels self-indulgent and, well y'know...like I'm trying to score sympathy-points, being a drama-queen or making some fucking obscure point about something or other. I still carry a lot of guilt and discomfort about this shit (and the bad stuff that preceded it), but I have to peel some of this dead skin off of me.

This is all kinda awkward and personal, but tbh this is the lightweight version. The really bad stuff I'm saving for either my memoirs or the grave lol.

I've had an, uh, interesting life, I guess.

If I could change one thing about that period tho it would be the fact that my wife had to suffer it with me. Without that illness, I wouldn't be who or what I am today, so - in a very weird way - I'm oddly thankful for having gone through it. It gave me the gift of a second life.

But I'm not thankful for the terrible burden it put on her. That's the one thing I'd change.

Burroughs spent a large chunk of his life "writing [his] way out of trouble." I've only spent the second half of this decade trying to do it. It's working out okay for me, I guess, but I've still got a long road ahead. A lot of words I still need to write down.

Like the rest of you, I'm just making this shit up as I go along.

FRACTAL FICTION

Fractal Fiction, a collaborative webcomic from Emperor and some artist/letterer pals.

Off to a v. promising start.

"SKY ROCKETS IN FLIGHT"

The recent weird spiral lights seen over Norway...



...are likely to be a failed Russian Bulava missile test. (via @Nemonymity )

Now this reminds me of a very early Tales of Suspense Iron Man story in the early 60's where a failed Stark Industries missile launch ended up with the rocket spiraling off out of control. A guidance system chasing its own tail. Moving in ever-decreasing circles.



I don't have the issue in question (too old/too expensive) otherwise I'd scan it - but I'm sure there's a Kirby/Heck picture of a damaged rocket turning a slow spiral - tho I may have a reprint Marvel Collectors Items Classics with it in somewhere. I'll have a rummage.

Interestingly, the Bulava is designed to be the ultimate end-game anti-anti-missile nuke - far more dangerous than anything the Koreans or Iranians could ever even imagine, yet it never, ever gets mentioned as a WMD, threat to the American mainland, etc. Obviously, it has a few teething problems lol; perhaps wh/ is why the US government seems to be so complacently comfortable with its existence. The fact that the Russians are still aggressively developing a new generation of intercontinental nukes (funded by Gazprom revenues?) is kinda worrying when we're all supposed to be pals these days in the War against Terrorism.

Who's the intended target - countries who don't pay their gas bills?

Or is it just the Russian equivalent of the US's Star Wars program - a Cold War 2 white elephant intended to grease politicians palms and the rusting wheels of industry?

TAPEBOX

Tapebox.

WAND

Long time Kid Shirt favourite James Jackson Toth aka Wand plays an unexpected last-sec show in London tomorrow nite, courtesy of The Great Pop Supplement label.

It's at the Betsey Trotwood, Farringdon from 8pm.

Wand
Hush Arbors
Rick Tomlinson (votsw) solo

£5 on the door!!!

Can't make it - nor the FACT magazine Christmas Party - gah! - but I was very fortunate to see him, Jessica and Keith play a few years ago, so I don't feel quite so bad about it.

CORNBREADD

Via Joker:

HALF-BAKED

The Skull of W.G. Grace sculpted from dough and baked. Badly.



It looked a helluva lot more like a skull before I put it in the oven - honest! My eldest daughter thinks it looks like a dog "in a Scottish hat" lol. She's got a point.

I forgot the flour would rise n expand.

Do(ug)h!

RIP JACK ROSE

Absolutely gutted to hear that guitarist Jack Rose has died.

A heart attack, appararently. He was only 38.

Many of you probably won't have even heard of him, but take my word for it that he was a fine, fine guitarist...it ain't hype to say that he had the potential to be one of the greatest of his generation.

He made a split record a little while back with some pals of mine. And a zillion great vinyls and CDs on his own. Like I said, a major talent - even though you might not even heard of him. Check his stuff out if you haven't already.

To be cut down like that before he'd even really hit his prime, well...

Here he is playing in Falmouth, down in the depths of my spirtual homeland Cornwall (one of a handful of adventurous US sub.alt.acts who've started venturing down there to play in recent years).

Go, Jack, go!



Postscript: just in from Cory at Three-Lobed Records, who puts it far better than I ever could:

"...our dear friend Jack Rose has passed away...Jack was a warm, caring person and was always a pleasure to be around. His larger than life spirit will truly, truly be missed even more so than his inspired musical ability. Our deepest sorrow goes out to his wife."

CLOCK DVA: "4 HOURS"

"In my dream I am older
Everything is soft, out of focus
There's this sound which disturbs me."

THE AUTO-NEGATING POST

Walking back from town I had this great (but ridiculous) idea for a joke film/comic-book 'pitch' that I was gonna post or tweet later for a bit of fun, then I started realising that it was actually a pretty good, commercial hi-concept pitch lol...

Once I'd shoehorned out a coupla of the more ludicrous elements I sudddenly groked that the whole damn thing actually had some wheels (literally)...and then a really cool (and logical!) title came to me when I was taking my boots off in the kitchen and now that I've started typing this I've realised I can't actually tell you anything about the idea whatsoever, so this post becomes a sort of stupid auto-negating thing.

What a completely useless (more than usual!) waste of your time. And mine too. Lol.

Sorry.

SPACE-CAPTAIN BART DE PAEPE

More tapes from Sloow. (Hi, Bart!)

I'm a big fan of what he does; have been for ages. He has the best beard in the biz.

Of the most recent releases, the Hunting Moon css in particular caught my eye. That cover - a Stacia from Hawkwind archetype caught in felt-tip freeze-frame, heh. Croatian SpaceRockDrone.



First time I met him in the UK a while back I asked about the felt-tip pen artwork - "That must take ages," I said - but he just shrugged and said (in that Flemish Schooner Skipper voice of his): "Not as much as you'd think."

I bet he's lying. Anyway, loove the artwork, loove the releases; Sloowtapes are a coonstant Kid Shirt favoourite.

Flashback to meeting original Hawkwind drummer Terry Ollis 3 or 4 years back who autographed my copy of "In search of Space" by chuckling and saying (as he scribbled over Stacia's blurred gatefold nudeform): "Not the first time I've been on top o'Stacia....hrurrh-hruuuh-hruuuch! "

A collection of dazzling live recordings by Croatia’s heavy psych band, chasing Hawkwind, Igra Staklenih Perli and Acid Mothers Temple in an evil labyrinth of disorientating rhythms, destroying guitars, complex sax, synth awareness and celestial knowledge. 120 copies

THINGS THAT SHOULDN'T BE ON CEILINGS #1 AND #2

Please feel free to jump in here at any point...

"BLACKOUT WAS IMENSE (SIC)"

More cryptic psychocartographical manifestations from the smog-enshrouded back-street walls of Olde Yeovil Towne:



"Blackout was imense" (sic)

Well, yes, of course it would be.

Three days without blogging doth not a full-on blackout make, I feel. But still, it seems far too long since I last broke word-bread with you, my Vics Vapo-Rub inhalin' bredren.

Hmmm: what shall I do? Review a record/cassette/piece of music? A book, perhaps? Make some goofy pronouncement or misplaced prediction? Tell you of my recent misfortune and travail?

Or shall we - together - all blow hard and long 'pon The Trumpet of Plenty?

THE 19F3 FAKE ACID-BLOTTER SHEET

Yeah, so I took the 19F3 label 'logo'...

...and made a kinda fake acid blotter-sheet type thing out of it ready to print off some CD-r labels n stuff:

Yeah, I like that.

Lick it and you get an electric shock. Then 30 minutes later you hear our entire roster of artists simultane-tane-tane-tane-tane-ously.

WERNECK / WRETCHMOND: "ONEIRIC HARDWARE"

Coming v. soon - the inaugural release on 19F3...



"Manipulated field-recordings of hard-drives and server-arrays from Belo Horizonte, Brazil, and Yeovil, Somerset."

It's also a helluva lot more, ah, fun than it sounds.

SALEM Vs GUCCI MANE

Lovin' these synthetic GothRap re-imaginings - "Round One" is like Atlanta seen through a fine veil of late-70's Sheffield rain - strangely touching (all things considered); a pang of sadness for something that you can no longer touch - while "Bird Flu" is ticcin' nervous-sounding hi-hats and downpitched cough-syrup vocals, oppressive n unhinged...joints achin', unhinged by fever; fibromyalgic beats. An un-Screwed mix.

Call me old-fashioned, but I'd like a physical release of these tunes.

Wish I'd had a camera when I saw The Human League for 75p in the top-floor Union Bar.

MAN FROM URANUS, ETC

More Cambridge stuff:

Pete recently suggested I checked out Man from Uranus, which I did....

He's (apparently) a Gulf War Vet who's a Stockhausen nut - so, uhmm, straightaway this taps into some of my current obsessions; he also hangs out here.

This track is a lot of fun and a good kicking-off point; it also tickles some of the fluffy Lo-Fi Prog Vs. Charity-Shop Electro-Accousmatic belly-buttons that I've been sniffin' recently:



Lush production-sound! (Sounds great to my bottom-end-damaged middle-aged ears)

Some of his other stuff is a lot more spacey n out-there (and - dare I say it? - more 'serious'-minded (whatever that means!)), but - see! - this is how we suck you into the Strange Wyrld O'Boffin Rock... make yuh chuckle a bit, then - before you know it - we getcha breakdancin' to Parmegiani...

Suckers!

MFU also plays in Rock with Electronics (what a great name!) - with The Doozer? - so, yeah... get yer bleeps n tones on...

Maybe he should join the OU.

THE DOOZER

The Doozer.

Saw him back here. Liked what I saw/heard. Amazingly, he knows Pete Um. Small world.

It's a Cambridge thing, innit.

CARLA BLEY BAND

Carla Bley Band 1977: Bob Stewart, Terry Adams, Mike Mantler, Roswell Rudd, Hugh Hopper, Andrew Cyrille, Elton Dean, John Clarke, Gary Windo and Carla!

DODGEM LOGIC

Here.

TODD: BIG RIPPER

So, yeah, okay then: Todd...yeah, right: why not. Right on.



The Howl, the Growl, the Power and the Herpes Sores.

Spazzboogie, Ed "Big Daddy" Roth, Punk Rock gone Bad. Sour milk in a superheated food-blender: "It's going too fassst. I...aaggggh! " Face scalded and a-peeling, the apprentice chef staggers backwards, burns his hand in the deep-fat fryer: it's like OJ Simpson in that blinkin' Police Squad film, lurching from one industrial-accident-in-the-workplace movie-moment to the next. Thumbs get sliced open on super-sharp paper; they trip over their colleagues, dropping boxes on their heads, falling down the stairs. Ow-oww-owwwwch! Todd fail their monthly Health & Safety audit. Again.

But we'll all have a laugh about it in the pub afterwards.

Here they sound - for all of 20 seconds - like *eek* The B52s - every orifice open - servicing an outlaw motorcycle gang on the escalator in M&S. The one that goes down into the Hades Food Hall.

And there they sound - for all of 40 seconds - like Bachman-Turner-Overdrive playing a show inside a cement-mixer. "Churn, churn, churn..." No, wait, that's the Byrds.

Listen to this LP and unleash your inner Canuck woodsman. Practice throwing axes. Nail a beaver to a tree. Terrorise an innocent family of out-of-state holiday-makers. Torture Dad and set fire to their winnebago.

It all sounds pretty scary and intense on paper, but it's just make-believe really, a cartoon. Isn't it?

So why does "The (R)wub" sound so wrong?

If the previous tracks sound like they're sung by a flash.mob of troglodytes, then why do the vocals on this sound like, I dunno, David Bowie on a phialful of downers? (do what with an umbrella?) And there's a sort of woozy after-image - a retarded approximation - of what the band foolishly think constitutes 'backing' vocals: a kinda wayward, louche, seasick, downwards-sounding wooooo-aahhhh thing. I think I find this track so unsettling because it's trying so fucking hard to be a 'proper' song - like it's trying to redeem itself for past sins. Past songs.

But, instead it sounds like it's slowly unravelling, unpicking its own stitches.

"French and in France" starts off like Chris Isaak fronting a Heavy Sludge band, but then it opens up into a metalised hoooooowl that slides down into a massive tunnel. Strange little cars speed past us, jockying for position under the endless tunnel lights. An endless curving tunnel. That ends.

Blame it on the Boogie. I do.



Yeah, so goodnight and fuck y'all...you...you clean-shaven squares.

TODD / HEY COLOSSUS / DETHSCALATOR @ THE WINDMILL

Ha! I keep meaning to review the Hey Colossus/Dethscalator split on RiotSeason; must remedy that. The new Todd album's fucking excellent too (Hi, Craig).

UNTITLED(S)

ISOBEL RUCKER: UNFURLING

"Unfurling” is a graphic novel drawn on a scroll of paper by Isabel Rucker. It stretches 450 feet and is 12 inches wide and is drawn in black ink pen with watery washes..."

A comic-book on a scroll: kinda fucks with your puny human notions of what constitutes a graphic novel, don't it?

She also invented her own peculiar version of Egyptian heiroglyphics and has some characters in the strip use it as their own language. Word-balloons filled with heiroglyphics: how cool is that...