In the bag this week
QUICKSPACE The Death Of Quickspace
Ragged but great krautrock influenced stuff from ex Faith healer
guitarist.
Great sense of near melody and some pretty folky guitar showing
through the heavy repetition.
Elements here reminiscent of brit glam especially Roxy

CLUSTER Zuckerzeit
First Moebius/Roedelius lp to utilise steady rhythm. Sugartime?
Certainly sweet use of melody though there are points where this does
get maybe a tad too ambient.
Wasn't expecting the use of instrumentation like guitars here since I
thought they were all electronic. but this is the only thing I've had
by them outside of an Eno collaboration that disappeared some years
back. That was good too.

DEXYS MIDNIGHT RUNNERS Searching For The Young Soul Rebels
Kevin Rowland and co in docker/Northern Soul style.
Always did love KR's voice and the chorus to Geno that goes on about
Academic Inspiration You Gave me none strikes me strange.
Multisyllabicism in pop songs whodathunkit?

SMITH AND MIGHTY Life Is..
Unsung ex Wild bunch bristolians 3rd lp.The pair were supposedly very
influential on their townsfellows. This has more noticeably synthetic
beats than I've noticed on others but still pretty soul orientated.
Ok I bought this on the strength of finally reading that book about
the bRistol scene a few months ago and because it was in a local
sale. Haven't taken it in enough so far. The track with Niji 40
toasting's pretty ok ne way as is the track Sea which has strange
echoes of Vangelis or someone.

NICK CAVE AND THE BAD SEEDS Nocturama
Latest lp sees a return to the burn.interspersed amongst the piano
balladry.
I've seen this dismissed already though I think it stands up quite
well, though the lyrics in a couple of places are a tad dodgy. The
Moon in June-isms of Rock of Gibraltar will hopefully be rethought if
played live and I'm not sure about the geraniums bit in the Chris
Bailey duet Bring it On. Dead Man in my Bed shows that Blixa can
still bring the noise, his bandmates too almost to the same degree.
I'm heavily reminded of Blixa's stuff on The first lp From Her To
Eternity, Warren Ellis shines as ever and Martin Casey is noticeably
good.
The closing track Babe, I'm on Fire burns for 15 minutes in Hammond
backed gospel style. Initial quantities come with the MTV baiting
video for this track.

DAVID BOWIE Ziggy Stardust 30th Anniversary Reissue
Grew up wiv this stuff coming in from my brother's room. Meant to
pick it up for ages, (as in 2 incarnations back anyway). Just heard
that this was a limited edition so grabbed it before it completely
disappeared.
I'm surprised by incipient appearances of sound that seems to want to
be boogie or country rock. Also by the idea that acoustic plus
electric guitar is somehow futruristic.
Works dashed well this thing sounds both deeply of its time and
timeless simultaneously

PIANO MAGIC Writers Without Homes
Eerie post-rock type stuff.
The lyricist here's great and this features the appearance of various
guest singers including Vashti Bunyan and the guy from Tarwater.
I hear echoes of things like This Heat in the heavy repetition. This
has been said to be a letdown in relation to their other stuff. This
is the only one I've heard and as such it don't seem to be. From this
experience this strikes me as a band I need to check out more.

ELECTRIC LIGHT ORCHESTRA First Light 30th Anniversary
The one lp by the ex-Move crew instead of Jeff Lynne controlled band.
Wood and Bevan left, Bevan returned and Wood is apparently a
contributor to ELO2.
Strange sound, a rock band with strings as integrated instruments
instead of mere orchestration. Wouldn't mind hearing a coupla these
tracks played by a normal instrumental line up sound like a few cello
parts would be great as electric leads. Omigod did sumbudy leave a
muso in me?

VARIOUS TROJAN Flashing Echo
The Trojan dub collection tracing the evolution between Andy Capp's
Pop a Top to 1980. Listening to this I hear how deeply the jazz
influence comes through in the instrumentalists playing. This is
mainly repetitive bass driven stuff with weird effects but the small
combo jazz thing gets me. Possibly not surprising thinking about the
background of some of these guys, the reform school outside of
Kingston doubled as a musical education especially in jazz, possibly
an attempt at actual reform giving the players a sense of self-worth?

PROCOL HARUM Classic Tracks And Rarities
This too has a sense of swing. I hadn't really heard the band too
much before picking this up. I did that cos Mr Mills of Shindig fame
said that the SRC sounded like they were heavily influenced, that I
don't see but this is great. Has the sombre stuff like Whiter Shade
of Pale and Homburg alongside a lot of lighter, whimsical stuff.
I've got The Paramounts cd with the cover of Mingus' The Mule which
possibly makes the jazz influence less surprising. Wondering what the
story is on Robin Trower since he was a Paramount and seems to be on
all but a coupla tracks here, though I know he left the Paramounts
before they changed their name.
Is his solo stuff any cop?

THIN WHITE ROPE Sack full Of Silver
The first major label lp by Davis California twisted twin-guitar crew
shows more expansive production. Television discover the west? Black
Sabbath of Americana? Whirling Dervish here is taken from a tune Guy
Kyser used to hear Daffy Duck sing in early 30s cartoons.
Yoo Doo Right is the Can track cut down to 6 minutes by a band that
on first hearing might seem to be a lot less improvisational than
repeated listening might reveal.
The live lp `The One That Got Away' shows exactly how easily they
could mess with structure.
On The Floe is floaty semi acoustic beat existentialism
Diesel Man is downright creepy the soundtrack to a psycho conversing
with an empty telephone to the sound of feedback swathes. This
demonstrates the bands ease with structure since there appears to be
a tune amongst the noise.
Kyser had about the best controlled feedback technique I've heard
(unless it's co-guitarist Kunkel) I know Kyser played with a thumb-
pick and now has a new band called The Mummydogs who I need to check
out.

ROBERTA FLACK First Take
Small jazz group plus orchestration backing Flack. Pretty different
to her later stuff.
Nice. Her version of The First Time I Saw your face runs shivers
through me. Plus she gives Leonard Cohen funky beats and gets away
with it on That's No Way to Say goodbye. Wonder what the original of
the Eugene Mcdaniels track 'Compared To What' sounds like since Brian
Auger does it very differently.

TIM BUCKLEY Return Of The Starsailor
Live at knebworth, most tasty. Love the Coltrane on guitar stylings.
Wish I knew the instrumental line-up. Wish somebody'd commercially
release the video this thing appears to soundtrack. I need to see
this cos I can't work out why I don't hear keyboards until several
tracks in.
Also includes a gig from Detroit just before he died in poorer sound
quality.
And the Monkees version of Song To The Siren with the `Puzzled as an
oyster' lyric intact.

STEREOLAB Sound-Dust
Bought this last year neglected it stuck it on and it's awful tuneful
Metronomic Melodic Mantras? The last from the late Mary Hansen sadly.
I thought she was an instrumentalist, here she's only credited as a
singer.
How much of a member was Sean O'Hagan? I remember sitting nexyt to
him on the tour bus on the 92 Irish tour but I thought he was a full
time High Llama, he's here though.
Jim O'Rourke guests too. Little instruments seem to be played live.
And sure Laetitia Sadier is a card carrying commie, strange
juxtaposition with the longeyness of this material.


CABARET VOLTAIRE The Original Sound Of Sheffield 78/82
The early stuff from the garagey new wave era including the No Escape
cover.
See the reissues have finally come out, must get more. Wish
somebody'd bring out The Clock Dva stuff too

CONGOS Heart Of The Congos
Spacious dub production on folk-gospel reggae lp leads to heaven? The
two voices are some of the sweetest ever and the repetition rivals
Reich or Glass.

HEARTS AND FLOWERS Now's The Time For Hearts And Flowers
Early country rock/bluegrass stuff with great harmonies and psych
touches. Great versions of I am A lonesome fugitive and `She Sang
Hymns Out Of Tune' and a version of Two Little Boys that retains some
level of poignancy. Bernie Leadon before Clark and way before
Eagledom and co on 2fer cd version of their 2 lps. I think this is
the same material that Collector's Choice on the first of their 2
disc set without the 13 extra tracks from that 2nd disc.

ELF POWER the winter is coming
Weird noisy rock melodies from Elephant 6 stable. Bouncy Folk rock
type noise with Dungeons and dragons type lyrics and a real sense of
melancholy/ennui running throughout. Strange mixture with the near
carnivelesque sound here.
Looks like the Elephant 6 stable have some great stuff.

SONIC MOOK EXPERIMENT "Future Rock & Roll"
Blast first compi from last year including Buff Medways, Liars ,Hives
etc.
The cover caused awful trouble, but everybody does it don't they?
Stevo
Np Smith& Mighty Life is so eventful