Flaming Creature

Stumbled upon this last night and dug it a lot, even with my nomenlateral biases. The phrase 'tribal trance' comes to mind. Neat videos too. Check 'em:

 

ALPHABET MIX - P is for 'Pornographic'

 

Another letter mix, another bad cover art. This one breaks the 80 minute mark but I wasn't satisfied removing any of the tracks so you'll have to make it a playlist. Not like anyone burns these to disc anyways, but its good to keep things shortish. Enjoy the exception!

01) Pepe Deluxe - Ask for a Kiss

02) Populous - My Winter Vacation (ft. Dose One)

03) Permanent Vacation - Absynth (Marcus Worgull Mix)

04) Pet Shop Boys - Fugitive (Richard X Extended Mix)

05) Patrick Cowley - I Got a Line on You

06) Paris Angels - Scope

07) Primal Scream - Loaded

08) Patti Smith - Free Money

09) Peter Perrett - Falling

10) Patrick Wolf - Tristan

11) A Place to Bury Strangers - You are the One

12) The Paper Chase - We Know Where you Sleep

13) Psychic Ills - January Rain

14) Pulp - F.E.E.L.I.N.G.C.A.L.L.E.D.L.O.V.E.

15) Pitch Yarn of Matter - Father

16) Peter Koppes - In the Wake

17) Paul Quinn & The Independent Group - Passing Thought

18) Placebo - Bubblegum

19) Pink Floyd - A Pillow of Winds

20) The Pastels - Crawl Babies

21) Plumstead Common - We Won't Get Fooled Again

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ALPHABET MIX - C You Next Sunday

01) The Charade - Monday Morning
02) California Snow Story - Suddenly Everything Happens
03) Cinnamon - Maybe
04) Comateens - A Place for Me
05) Captain Sensible - There Are More Snakes than Ladders
06) Close Lobsters - Hey Hey, My My
07) Care - An Evening in the Ray
08) Comet Gain - Steps to the Sea
09) Cleaners From Venus - Red Guitars and Silver Tambourines
10) The Candyskins - Never Will Forget You
11) Celestial - Bluebell Meadow
12) The Clientele - The Queen of Seville
13) The Clean - Simple Fix
14) Clay Hips - I Won't Say
15) The Chills - Falling Off Your Throne
16) Cath Carroll - Breathe For Me
17) The Chameleons - Looking Inwardly
18) Christian Death - The Blue Hour
19) Claire Hamill - Stars
20) Cocteau Twins - Sugar Hiccup
21) Chapterhouse - Pearl


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ALPHABET MIX - F-18

This is the first in a series of pure pop mixes made to herald the coming of warm weather and as you can see from the tracklist below, all of the bands and artists begin with the letter 'F'. It's loosely inspired by an idea that I got from Bill Drummond and in theory, I'd like to do the whole alphabet before summer, though certain letters may need to be skipped ('Q,' for instance, as much as I have a soft spot for Quando Quango). I'll just try to do as many as I can.

Tracklist:

01) The Friendly Fires - Arkansas
02) Future Bible Heroes - Losing Your Affection
03) Fine China - For All Centuries
04) Frankie Rose - Know Me
05) The Field Mise - Missing the Moon
06) Fascinator - Sexuality Mystery
07) Fanuelle - These Fourteen Days
08) The Field - Everybody's Got to Learn Sometime
09) Flaming Lips - Ego Tripping (Self Admiration with Blow Up mix)
10) Flipmode Squad - This is What Happens
11) Fleetwood Mac - Dreams (Flight Facilities remix)
12) Frankie Knuckles - Rain Falls
13) F.R. David - Can't Get Enough
14) Friendzone - I Miss Y'all
15) The Frogs - I've Got Drugs (Out of the Mist)
16) The Freshies - Fasten Your Seatbelts
17) Family - Dark Eyes
18) The Free Design - Felt so Good

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Mark von Schlegell - Mercury Station (2009)

If nothing else, this was a very unique book. It is equidistantly divided between comical hard sci-fi and fantasy, almost like Philip K. Dick meets Cormac McCarthy. The narrative is quite fragmented, convoluted at times even, which was it's biggest problem for me. Time is distorted, characters take parallel roles within other characters, the chapters jump back and forth between events and eras with little or no exposition. Although this style seems appropriate given the technicalities of the plot, the characters and epochs get sucked into a vortex and everything converges towards the end and I think there could have been some more literal explanations of just what the fuck is going on. Like, an additional 200 pages, more, but then again it might have been heavy-handed and too much. I can't help but think of the line in Adaptation when Nicolas Cage asks his fictional twin brother just how he plans to write/shoot his screenplay which has 3 characters who are all actually one, so I guess I have to give the author here some props for tackling such a difficult and complex task.

Outside of the narrative, it's really quite skillfully written, possessing some of the best prose I've yet to encounter in a work of science fiction. The dialogue remains witty throughout, at times quite funny as well, being how there is hardly any amicable regard between any two of the characters, mortal, machine, spirit, or beast, and the author has imbued every character with equally sarcastic and sharp-as-Muramasa-blade tongues, so you can see the possibilities for humor. There is also an encyclopedic amount of depth and detail in the worlds, both future and past. The languages and cultures all seem very realized and this is what makes the book enjoyable to read despite its back and forth leaps from one scenario to the next.

Regarding re-ups

So with all the pressure that's been being put on file upload sites, its kind of hard to keep all my old files online. Its like playing a reverse version of the arcade game where you smash gophers. I know from the comments I've been getting that a lot of you are desperately seeking some albums I've posted whose links are no longer working.

It would be much easier to download soulseek, as I have every album I own shared nearly 24/7. Send me an email and I'll give you my user name, or just search for the album and it should be there. Sorry if anyone's dreams got smashed by the man.

My Bloody Valentine - mbv (2013)

How long have we been waiting? How long has Kevin's titillation tortured us? Is he a sadist? Is this album just a bottle to milk the old cash cow? or is it really as good as everyone on the internet seems to claim? Do you like a record just because you really want to like a record?

The first thing I want to mention, before people start calling me a blasphemous contrarian, is how I approached this album. Simply, I wanted it to be something other than it is, though I recognize that it could have been something far more disappointing. In the two decades since Loveless was released, the handful of Kevin Shields releases/remixes and mbv demos that have popped up here and there have been all over the place, stylistically speaking, but the one thing they all had in common was that they were moving towards a 'poppier' and fuller trajectory. mbv, however is mostly a sparse experimental record, comparatively. The tempo has slowed down, and the melodies are more sedated. Yet it's not necessarily quieter, but it's certainly not the bombardment of noise we've come to expect. Everything seems stripped down and many aspects seem lazy. The title of record, the album art, the song titles. The music itself, too, and a prime example of this is in "Nothing Is," which is makes Ravel's "Bolero" seem ichorous. It makes you wonder where the line between genius and desultory lies in the context of experimental music. I think the biggest problem of all that mbv suffers from is that the delicate balance between harmony and discordance has been disrupted. There is now discordance within this relationship and that seems to be what is lacking. 

There no doubt that there's beauty to be found in this record, but so far (three and a half listens in), I'm still not impressed. If Loveless was made on ecstasy, heroin and cheap wine this must have been made on xanax and IPAs. I was hoping for something truly progressive like Loveless +20 years of creative steeping, as I'm sure we all were, but sadly this has just been done before and been done way better (eg. back in 1991). Furthering my disappointment is that not one song on this record better than some of the post-Loveless unreleased demos. "Kevin Song" in particular may very well be my very favorite mbv track and I was hoping a mastered version would wind up on here or at least they'd take continue with more of that sound, but no. On a certain forum I heard someone refer to this as a "modern tragedy in 3 parts" and was calling it the album of the year/decade/etc. First of all, its a little too early for the latter claim, and secondly: no. I mean I'm prone to hyperbole as much as the next excitable fellow, but just... no. No.

All that being said, its an above-average album and far better than most of the dreck that gets hyped these days. It has a few songs I really enjoy, but it is nowhere near its mathematically flawlesss predecessor, which was a spiritual journey through the human condition. Who knows, maybe I'll change my mind after a few hundred more listens, but really it just seems like mbv-lite, and that's a shame since we've been waiting a long goddamn time.

Here is "Kevin Song" for those who haven't heard it (in my opinion one of the best pop songs ever recorded, even in the rough.)