Sweeping The Nation said something very kind about us but it also doubles up as evidence of another unsatisfied customer regarding Wiki Upload. i’d like to inform readers (uhm, hi?) that this use of wiki is not really through preference, but more because it appeared to keep all files for an indefinite period of time for free and wouldn’t hassle visitors with pop-ups about some casino with computer-animated wannabe neo-rat-packers slyly taking dollar off you, or porn. Turns out the catch is that nobody can download the bloody files.
This is probably an apt time to tell you that i’m not a technophobe, i’m just incompetent. i don’t hate technology, yet technology seems to at the very least think i’m a bit of a knob. So from now on, i’ll be doing what i know, i.e. sticking all files that i can’t link to directly on YSI and then if you the viewer want any of the files that have run out we can either stick them up again or e-mail them to you. We’ve got a week to think about it anyway so hold your horses. (They might be lonely.)
Where was i? Oh yes.
Did i say that 2006 was my worst year on record? Now, that was very self-indulgently and disgustingly 3mo of me. Particularly as 2005 was worse. i jest, of course, 2005 wasn’t particularly bad per se – we’ve all got access to electricity, clean water, warmth, companionship, open skies, abundant medicine, decent meals and the new Robyn single, let’s have a little perspective here – it’s just that other years were particularly better. Anyway, most of my memories of 2005 are happy ones, particularly 12th July for reasons too happifying to go into now, and 9th/10th/11th September for being the weekend i was an attendant at my favourite festival line-up ever.
There were great songs too.
Magoo – Robot Twin
The first truly great album of 2005 arrived on the doormat at the end of 2004 in a Christmas card from Norwich. The album was called Pop Songs, although really with it being a double-CD release that only resulted in eight songs it was difficult to really know what to call it. It was, it transpired, a stop-gap of sorts, re-announcing Magoo as an album band after four years of LP-release dormancy since 2001’s Realist Week. (The follow up, The All Electric Amusement Arcade, didn’t appear until June last year). As well as the awe-striking joy and depth of the music, one thing that i absolutely adore about the album is its title. Pop Songs. Go on, say it to yourself. Pop Songs. Pop Songs. It’d be great if it was really an album of discordant abrasive concrete noise collages but as it actually is an album of pop songs, there’s really something very…satisfying about it. Pop Songs. i don’t know why nobody had thought of it before. Pop Songs.
This Et Al – All You’ll Ever Be Is A Dancer
This Et Al were another lot that sent me a great deal of releases and information at a time when bands from Leeds (UK) were quite hot property with the indie cognoscenti, yet being on the Dance To The Radio label meant they were, and are, forever in the shadow of ¡Forward, Russia! who, despite the odd cracking tune and a natty song-titling system, never made (and judging by their new material, probably never will make) anything as frantic and frenetic and bitter or better than ‘All You’ll Ever Be Is A Dancer’. This is the track that i place blame on for my current year-old habit of having to listen to certain songs on a loop several times over just because one spin isn’t enough and, by crikey, i still try and hit that high note on the last chorus. And to think this was a b-side.
Alter Ego Distort – Statements Galore
Along with a wealth of local bands like The Sways, Alter Ego Distort were another pleasant surprise that found their way through the letterbox (not literally, it was a demo of their EP ‘…in all oceans now’) all the way from Sweden. Sadly i can’t tell you anything about what they’re up to now as their official website has disappeared from cyberspace and their delicate yet soaring indiepop uber-tunes never even got a proper release. Injustice, much?
Saint Etienne – Teenage Winter
i adore Saint Etienne (and their website) and have done since barely older than toddler age, gawping a gap-toothed smile at the delight of ‘You’re In A Bad Way’ oozing from the car stereo. Which is why 2005’s Tales From Turnpike House rather disappointed me – well, that and David Essex. i even ended up having a lengthy e-mail correspondence debate with a 50-year-old backing vocalist called Ingemar Gustavsson (who i think may have even been on the album) about how everybody trying to do Beach Boys harmonies at that time (this was quite shortly after the eventual release of Smile, you see, hence it was en vogue) were just going to sound inferior, even the Et. ‘Teenage Winter’ however made up for all of it; it was bleak, forlorn, melancholic to the point of misery, bursting with regret and i couldn’t get enough of it. It was probably too close to the bone – i know where that Sainsbury’s is, i know the second hand shop that is suffering from eBay’s success and i definitely know those Christmas cards you can’t bear to throw away. But on a happy note, their appearance at the aforementioned Bestival, particularly the glorious closing rendition of ‘He’s On The Phone’ played to a crowd of enraptured C86 fanatics was a highlight in a weekend of highlights.
Talking of Bestival another artist there was Kid Carpet who i missed because he clashed with Super Furries and frankly there was no contest. i did however see his DJ set where in between spinning his own records and bits of 2 Many DJs bootlegs he ‘played out’ the likes of ‘Rah Rah Rasputin’ and ‘Who’s Afraid Of The Big Bad Wolf?’ If i had his b-side ‘£1500 and a Bus Apology’ or the superlative ‘Bristol Carpet Factory’ on me i’d play you those, but instead you can have the cover version that a lot of people remember him for:
Kid Carpet – Jump
It was a very indie year it seems, but there was little more…oh go on then…twee than Pete Dale’s collection of songs with his band Milky Wimpshake. As an example, here are three versions of a song about love and The Beatles, and one minute-long punk song about a milkshake taster. Yep.
Milky Wimpshake – My Heart Beats Faster Than Techno (live version)
Milky Wimpshake – My Heart Beats Faster Than Techno (7” version)
Milky Wimpshake – My Heart Beats Faster Than Techno (French version)
Milky Wimpshake – Milk Maid
i’ll leave you with a rather muddy representation of quite possibly the most exciting moment of live music i witnessed in 2005, particularly the moment just before the vocals start. Hold on tight:
4 comments:
I wish I was skinny enough to fit/dance into that electric blue bikini.
Sad face.
i love you just the way you are.
I'm not entirely sure what I was expecting, but I am surprisingly touched but that comment.
Although......it was a pretty big assumption that I am Me. I am. Lucky for you.
But- i would never had seen that video if not for you, and, even if she is so so much skinnier than me I still enjoyed it. So thankyou.
Of course i thought it was you love. No-one else is reading. Not that it would matter really, i'm only doing this because of you. So thank YOU.
Just between you and me, and the rest of the internet, no-one that skinny could be anywhere near as attractive as you. Even if that is pushing my luck.
You okay Bee?
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