Here are today’s favourite misheard words from the Nirvana transcripts:

Sao Paulo = Sun Hollow
Leonard Cohen = Lenny Cohen

Posted by Everett True on Friday, April 29th, 2005
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“Look, there’s Vincent Gallo,” remarks one Sleater-Kinney fan at the Camden Barfly.
No, they weren’t referring to the film star, but myself – having eulogised the wonder of having sex with Mr Gallo again as part of an intro medley of Legend! songs at the ICA the previous night. That one was fun; some dude I’d played table tennis against asked if he could drum with us on stage – it gave him something to do. Turned out to be Sam from one of my favourite Brighton bands, The Go Team. Neat. He flurried and spanked his way through an array of enthusiastically tackled cover versions – the Modern Lovers’ ‘Morning Of Our Lives’ went down far better than it should’ve done, especially seeing as how Jon and Kelly had absolutely no idea where to fit in the chorus, but there again it’s a great song – and ‘originals’. Carrie Brownstein remarked afterwards she particularly enjoyed how I asked the crowd whether they wanted me to “do a spoken word number or finish up” and then didn’t give them a choice and launched straight into the spoken word. People laughed: some even heckled and cheered. No sobbing. I was distracted by how easily you could see people entering and leaving at the back of the hall, and said so. Television Personalities’ ‘Someone To Share My Life With’ and the Daniel Johnston cover were also appreciated…but again, good songs. My intro threw my band off, somewhat – especially as I changed my mind over what I was doing seconds before opening my mouth.
“I’ve now seen you perform four times, and you’re totally different each time,” remarked Rose Pipette afterwards. I took it as a compliment.
On London Bridge station later, I distinctly heard someone say “Modern Lovers” as I walked past. Cool.

Start of the second evening, I asked: “Anyone see Sleater-Kinney last night?” A few cheers sounded. “Anyone see my set?” Again, a few cheers broke out. “Then you can all bugger off back to the bar and get yourselves a drink because we’re going to do exactly the same set. Exactly.” No one moved, and even odder, the room remained in total silence during the set – bereft of Sam, but with Jon Slade and Kelly playing way more in time, even sometimes the same song. First song, an a cappella Billie Holiday number, I forgot the final verse and there was this very peculiar 20-second gap of silence before I returned to the music stand to sing it. Nice. Someone remarked afterwards that I was extremely intimidating on stage. I thought I was a deadpan laugh riot, like Calvin Johnson. Serious. ‘Talk Open’ got extended to 10 minutes – a frenzy of guitars and wailing – during which I freely improvised about loneliness and death and phones ringing that aren’t there. Cheerful stuff.
Watched some of Sleater-Kinney after, to reassure myself that the ladies are still as powerful and emotionally charged as before. (They are.) Gutted that Janet Weiss didn’t drum with us – she offered but rescinded when she realised we were first on.
Thoroughly enjoyed The Long Blondes even if they didn’t play my favourite (Christmas) song and have clearly watched too many Pulp videos for their own goods: “They sound like they all used to play ska-punk when they were younger,” remarked a passing Plan B staff writer. I took it as a compliment. I’m not sure he meant it that way.

Posted by Everett True on Friday, April 29th, 2005
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{{popup GlenJones2.JPG GlenJones2 576×456}}The ark of the covenant, a very bright fridge or Glen Jones’s fx collection?

Posted by Frances May Morgan on Friday, April 29th, 2005
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Having made all my friends listen to Gang Gang Dance, I skipped out on their Spitz gig. I texted a friend to tell her one of the reasons why and the pesky brain of my phone told me that I had “ant trouble”. I stared at this for a moment and couldn’t work out how I had made the mistake. This, as much as anything, forced me under the big blanket, where I watched both Paradise Lost films, back to back (and came away swollen eyed, thinking, as one of the subjects wails, that West Arkansas is indeed hell). while everyone I knew went out dancing to Gang Gang Dance. Except, as Horton tells me the next day, people weren’t dancing. How could they not? I asked. Is this true? Can anyone confirm this report? Because there is something wrong if people go stand around to Gang Gang Dance. I am concerned for our solemn youth.

In the spirit of spring hibernation, ant trouble, melancholia, whatever, I vacillate about the Cul de Sac show tonight, and inbetween vacillations scratch my ears with some weird shit from Dublin on this here label. These double adaptor dudes purport to be a miniature improvising electronic bar band, which sounds rather lovely. I think of tiny creatures hunched over tinier laptops and brandishing teeny tiny saxes. The sound, appropriately, is small, but in a good way: a tight knot of frustration and laughter. I like it. My head hurts. Ant trouble.

Posted by Frances May Morgan on Thursday, April 28th, 2005
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{{popup RIMG0006.JPG RIMG0006 640×480}}the dalston portal 1

Posted by Frances May Morgan on Thursday, April 21st, 2005
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Posted by Sarah Bowles on Saturday, April 16th, 2005
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cheers Ant.

Posted by Sarah Bowles on Friday, April 15th, 2005
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SOUND/TEXT

Capitol K + Amy Prior and Trinie Dalton + Simon Bookish + Pil and
Galia Kollectiv + Emma Hedditch + Frances May Morgan

Wednesday 20th April, 8pm
Spitz, 109 Commercial Street, London, E1
£5

A group show from musicians, writers, film-makers and curators
crossing geographical and genre boundaries. This global collaboration
of sound and text from cities celebrates the contemporary urban experience.

Featuring:

Capitol K collages together dictaphoned urban field recordings - from
Tokyo, Hong Kong, London, Barcelona, Tai Pei - and fuses them with
electronic and acoustic sound (guitar/Arabic lute), vocals, text
fragments and a pop sensibility.

Los Angeles-based writer Trinie Dalton and London-based writer Amy
Prior read short fiction set in their home cities from new
collections: ‘Lost On Purpose’ (an international, border-crossing
collection of fiction from cities), ‘Wide-Eyed’ (Akashic Books/Little
House on the Bowery Series ed. by Dennis Cooper) and a new London
fiction collection. Also includes the screening of a short film: ‘The
Slow Ones’ is a haunting portrait of the fast track to love in London
in the slow post-college years - a collaboration between writer Amy
Prior, musician Capitol K and artists/curators Pil and Galia Kollectiv.

Live performance of a new text-based piece by cult musician,
ex-librarian Simon Bookish. Notorious for his exuberant live shows,
Bookish is one of the UK’s most unusual artists, effectively fusing
new wave pop and electro with a background in contemporary classical and
experimental music, treading a fine line between dance floor sensation
and performance art chaos.

DJ Frances May Morgan (editor of music magazine Plan B)
plays foreign pop.

City short film programme curated by London film-maker Emma Hedditch.

websites:
www.capitolk.com www.amyprior.net www.simonbookish.com
www.planbmag.com www.kollectiv.co.uk www.andiwilldo.net

Posted by Frances May Morgan on Thursday, April 14th, 2005
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Discovered a couple of old recordings while searching for old Nirvana interview tapes yesterday - including this tape recorded with Damon & Naomi in their Boston apartment some time back in ‘90, or thereabouts. The concept, as I recall it, was to create a present-day Folkways recording. Folkways was a label dedicated to documenting otherwise lost Americana, through both story and song: in-between songs the artist would be interviewed about the circumstances the songs were recorded in, and the inspiration. So we trawled through The Legend!’s career and life. (Oh my God! There’s a version of The Beatles’ ‘What Goes On’, guitar from Damon. Oh my God. I didn’t know this existed.)

Another tape included a handful of songs recorded with Calvin Johnson and Heidi (?) in Olympia shortly before, including a Ramones/Shop Assistants tribute. I was excited to find both: and furthermore, an interview tape conducted with Slint in Louisville, 1992(?). Yes that’s right: an interview tape with the legendarily press-shy band that never did interviews. Hmm. It’s never been transcribed, either - because they said they would much prefer it if I didn’t.

There’s a recording of Courtney Love, singing a few songs from Celebrity Skin a cappella down the phone. At the time I mistook them for Tobi Vail seranading my flatmate with new Bikini Kill material, although I’ve never admitted that to her.

There’s a Vaselines interview tape.
There’s the unmastered tape of In Utero (with songs that must have surely seen the light of day by now).
There are the original PJ Harvey and Lush and Huggy Bear demos.

Whatever. Fine night downstairs at the Albert last night with the Plan B pop quiz: sang the lyric round (Michael Jackson songs) to the tune of songs requested from the audience, gave away a copy of Dingbats (”You don’t have to be crazy to play this game…but it helps!”) as a booby prize. Here’s my playlist.

Chin Chin - We Don’t Want To Be Prisoners
Pretenders - Stop Your Sobbing
Go-Go’s - We Got The Beat
Avengers - Paint It Black
Les Surfs - Tu Seras Mi Baby
Rachel Sweet - B-A-B-Y
The Petticoats - Normal
Holly And The Italians - Tell That Girl To Shut Up
Jesse Garon & The Desperadoes - Grand Hotel
Blondie - Denis
Marine Girls - Don’t Come Back
The Fizzbombs - Beach Party
Darby Sisters - Go Back To Your Pontiac
Judy Brown - I’m Such A Fool
Lonnie’s Legends & The Currents - Look For Another Love
Altered Images - See Those Eyes
Carmel - I’m Not Afraid Of You
Eighth Wonder - I’m Not Scared
Girls At Our Best - Politics!

Oh, I’ve got another record/CD/book sale this coming Sunday (17/4) 10 am - 12 noon. If you’re interested email me ET sale for details. My well-known Guiness-fuelled chocolate cake is a possibility but not a promise.

Posted by Everett True on Tuesday, April 12th, 2005
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Presenters: Everett True, Jon Slade

New records from Electrelane, Scout Niblett, Sleater-Kinney, She Said! and Arcade Fire

(more…)

Posted by on Monday, April 11th, 2005
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