…… Metals by Feist. The plaintive vocal style with some disjointed guitars.

With the new film coming out, it reminded me how fantastic the the original drawings are. When I see them I always think “Herge’s Adventures of Tintin” in that Hollywood voice… I hope it says it at the beginning of the film!

On a recent family trip to London to do all the tourist stuff you never get round to doing… we had a look around Buck House. In the Queens back yard, a sort of cream tea marquee has been erected. Everything was £4. Strawberries, Tea, Coffee, Apple Juice, all £4. I was sort of expecting my tea to come in white china with the gilt edging, but what we got were paper cups. But I really liked them.

Well, what did I expect from one the most recently hyped indie-rockers? Dunno, I have waited a few weeks before posting about this album and still have not made up my mind. When I first heard some tracks on 6Music courtesy of Mark Riley, I thought, yes, this lot have something to say other than their 4th Form snigger track ‘Post break up sex’.

But the subsequent purchase of the CD left me a bit flat. Owning the songs in a tangible form leaves me empty, perhaps I should have downloaded the album and that would have left not such a sense of loss!

Just when you think any of these songs will get tuneful and melodic, they surge off at a tangent or 179 degrees! ‘Two Doves’ starts as a soft folk-song then starts invading your ears. Early songs on the album zig and zag around in eclectic sound waves and voices. The influence of Joanna Newsom is apparent without the harp and orchestration. Not an easy listen but nevertheless well worth the effort as you hear familiar refrains.

The poster says it all! Looking forward to the show/gig/performance/entertainment.

One of the latest offerings from Alt Country’s bad boy harks back to Ryan’s days working with New Yorker, Jesse Malin in their collective, The Finger. I suppose these short punk orientated songs are a release from the normal melodic country songs but one cannot be happy with this self-indulgent quota of blast. This release on vinyl and available as an import through Ryan’s Pax-Am label does have a digital download for use on the iPhone, which is something. However, to go to these lengths to listen to this grunge, I cannot help but be disappointed. There will also be available two CD’s worth of of songs from the ‘Easy Tiger’ sessions. Can I bring myself to invest time and money in what well could be a load of reject tunes? I get the feeling it is going to be a last hooray, or that horror, as The Cardinals split from Ryan. After all he wants to be an icon of ‘Rock & Roll’.

At the CIA Cardiff on Friday night all our senses were assaulted by a barrage of output, initially from Ben Elton with alice-band look-a-like Hot Chip. A series of good old pop & dance beats blasted from the stage with the sound waves shaking the floor and vibrating the very clothes I was standing in! It was all rather hypnotic, the crowd were definitely ‘up for a good time’ leaping around the place as if their lives depended on it.

However this excitement was shortly to be outclassed by the arrival on stage of LCD and James Murphy. Like a giant striding into his realm he launched into ‘Dance Yourself Clean’ and expunged Hot Chip’s ‘Buggles’ pop sound with a driving, pounding rhythms spurred on by Murphy and their excellent drummer. The audience responded with enthusiasm to the further assault on their systems by driving towards the stage with more people joining in the melee all the time. This is the band they had come to see. To think that on this short tour these bands take turns to go on first,
I pity The Buggles having to follow LCD!!

This short, sharp delight of an album, it’s under 32 minutes long, features song after song of mini prog rock epics harking back to the early seventies.
Your ears are bombarded with prog rock riff after prog rock riff edited segments that lean towards Yes, Genesis and very early Family. Each track reaches its choral climax and bang, you are listening to the next track! Quick, gutsy and clean without the pretentious clamoring of Muse, the album makes you smile, then laugh. Thank you 6Music and Mark Riley for playing ‘Daisy’ the other evening, thus making me reach for my wallet.

The best live electric blues album…ever! Better than his ‘Live in Europe’ album from 1971. Recorded on both sides of the border during the ‘troubles’, Rory was one of the few musicians to transcend the religious divide. With masterful playing and pure hard work he never let the audience down. I was lucky enough to see him play live twice at Portsmouth Guildhall and the Reading Festival. On each occasion the depth of tone and soaring notes resonated in the memory for days after. A man of few words, he invented text speak a generation before it became the norm with speed of his delivery after a song. Thk u gd’nit!