Back In The Blog Life Again

In the midst of a fairly calamitous week – lost wallet, lost replacement bank card, lost girlfriend.. – my laptop opted to die recently.  The absence of a bank card and indeed cash in general meant it’s taken me a goodly while to recover my bloggish pretensions.  But here we are, all ready to go once again!

Since I last blogged, the following things have happened:

- It’s been mighty sodding hot in London
- Murraymania has overtaken Wimbledon, with the Briton in last eight of the men’s – indeed, the gentlemen’s (sorry) – singles
- Neil Young, Bruce Springsteen and Dizzee Rascal in particular produced Glastonbury epics, and I did my usual thing of spending the weekend wishing I was there
- Farrah Fawcett has died

Have I missed something?  Hmm.. possibly the suspicious, murky demise of the King of Pop.  Plenty enough has been said about this, plenty of bad and good jokes have been made, and I’ve bitched on Facebook that I feel a little sorry for poor Farrah – a brilliant actress who had no dodgy history with young children – so let’s leave it there.  His private life aside, Jackson was a pioneering genius: no-one seems to be arguing that, and rightly not.

A blog on Glastonbury to follow, plus plenty of other things bubbling up in my mind over the last month, and news of some fine new musical tadpoles you might be inclined to check out.  But for now, the sun’s out, my laptop’s working, and it’s good to be back!

MP3:
Steve Winwood – Back In The High Life Again (Zshare)

Purchase Links:
Steve Winwood – Back In The High Life (album)

The Severed Limb

Today I went to the excellent Vauxhall Car Boot Art Fair, outside the former Truman Brewery off Brick Lane.  It was a fabulously kooky, extravagant affair, burlesque and grotesque in places, shy and loveable in others, with bargains aplenty and more crazy characters than your average David Lynch triple bill.  As the name would suggest, it was mainly art-focused, but there was also plenty of food and drink and a stage with sporadic performances.

As I wandered around giddily in the hot sun, slaloming between robot palm readers and men in pink-neon one-pieces, I caught the end of a set by The Severed Limb.  Looking very East London, with braces over vintage tee-shirts, Brylcreemed quiffs and awkward charm, the seven-piece (all men) performed a  rollicking lo-fi number, driven by howling guitars and lifted by their singer’s boyish voice.  Other than blandly saying “folk”, I’m not really sure how to label their stuff, if labelling were required – skiffle is the verdict of their MySpace page, while I detected whiffs of rockabilly, jive and Elvis, and that just in the one song.  Whatever, it’s good, lively stuff and really good fun to tap your feet to.  Listening to more of the band’s stuff on the aforementioned MySpace page, their accordions and harmonicas take me back to an imagined yellowy age of voiceboxes and Johnny Cash country, while the fast, fun riffs make me want to twirl around with a pretty girl, and then take her to a drive-thru cinema.  The page also features a dance-y remix of one of their songs, the addition of big, bouncy electro beats making for an interesting, if-not-wonderful, twist on The Severed Limb’s normal fare.

I talked to some of the band afterwards, and they told me of a couple London dates coming up:

Thu 18 Jun: The Montague Arms
Sun 5 Jul: Southwark Irish Festival, Peckham Rye

There are plenty of performances in the counties just outside London listed, too.  Catch them if you can.

myspace.com/theseveredlimb

MP3: The Severed Limb – Are You Loathsome Tonight? (Lalory Space Cowboy Remix)

So you want to be my friend, do you?

I spend a lot of time on MySpace – listening to new music, adding as friends new acts I’ve found via other means, messaging a few friends and checking my favourite musicians’ concert listings for news of freshly-announced London shows (although Songkick is making this latter task redundant – more of that in a later post).  The consequence of all this time on MySpace, and of having so many cool acts as ‘friends’, is that a constant stream of musicians friend-request me.

I try and listen to all of these, just because I feel like I should since the artist/band went to the effort of adding me.  On average I like one in five, perhaps, so it’s well worth it.  Anyway, I figured I’d do a regular slot on here, reviewing a bunch of these acts at a time, somewhere close to 100 words per request.  And here’s the first batch:

This Means War
Oooh and we’re off and already it seems war is indeed imminent - some Metallica-like guitars, as epic as a jog around Mars, gives way to the type of thrash guitars I thought had died out ears five years ago on in what Darwin might call natural selection.  I can positively see Linkin Park headbangers swinging their dreadlocks in psychopathic glee as I scramble to close the tab.  “WORTTCCCHHH URRRSSSS BURRRRNNN!!!!!!!”.  No sir I won’t watch you burn.  Why don’t you quit with the pyromania, lose the growly voice and trade in those super-charged amps for, say, a harmonica?  Or maybe a flute?  That would be nice.
Friend request: denied
myspace.com/thismeanswarband

The Nubbish
Despite it’s notable name, ‘Retarded Conficius’ is a dainty lil’ piece of soft-rockabilly, with some jangling guitars and Christopher Cross-style solo sections.  It’s inoffensive, but unremarkable.  What to play next?  Bloody hell, what a load of bollocks – there’s one song called ‘Ronnie Ronnie Red Balls’ and another named ‘Sweet Ball Buster’.  For no particular reason I’m going for the former and… blimey.  It’s like a soft-porn version of Rocky Horror: demented male voices, throbing strings and occasional pantomime screams.  Oh noooo you don’t…
Friend request: denied
myspace.com/thenubbish

Stefan Mac
Instead of the usual please-listen-to-me message, Dutch deejay Stefan has gone with the cryptic “D T F”.  No idea what that means, nor indeed if he’s related to the insanely annoying Annie Mac.  I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt, though, and say no.  In fact this is the sort of thing Annie would like: a charming techno cascade of knob-beats firmly aimed at the MDMA addict or BT-caller-on-hold.  ‘Street Fighter II: Player Select’ is faster and funner than the rest, but like all music designed for computer game interludes, it gets boring and repetitive after, mm, 10 seconds.  Game over, Stefan.
Friend request: denied
myspace.com/stefanmac

The Agency
Pleading for my friendship with this cryptic message – “We are not the agency from kiwiland. We are lying. Not me. But don’t believe them” – French-based, English-speaking The Agency launch into rather hypocritical electro-pop number ‘Significant’, it’s macabre beats sadly undermined by chirpy “whees”.  On a quest for greater consistency, I adopt a time-honoured MySpace tack and load up the band’s most-played song – in this case, ‘Bumpers’.  It’s better: a more subdued, elegant chorus, and a happy-go-lucky melody that lends the same contented feeling brought on by a first walk in newly-bought, impossibly white trainers.  I wake up enough to listen to ‘Red States’, remixed by one Fredo Viola no less, and this really is good stuff, too: imbibed with catchiness, yet still rather hypnotic and boasting distant vocals that curiously make me think of Jon & Vangelis, and a closing, funereal organ sequence.  Weirdsville, Tennesse.  I love it.
Friend request: accepted
myspace.com/theagencyrocks

Phew – male torture, Blade Runner-esque pop and Dutch computer music.  It’s been quite an hour.  Sadly I’ll have to cut it there as I’m due in Clapham tonight.  More soon…

MP3:
The Agency – Bumpers

Purchase Links:
The Agency – Not Similar

Some Of It Was True! – the name explained

Before I write about anything else, and while still firmly in start-up mode, I want to dwell briefly on this blog’s title, Some Of It Was True! – and to try to explain it a little.

It’s taken from a couplet I adore in London Calling, surely The Clash’s most famous song:

“London calling, yeah I was there too,
And you know what they said, well some of it was true!”

So why this particular row of words?  Well, there be a few reasons…

1. This blog is going to largely focus on the London music scene – the experience of being a music-lover in London.  Given that, it seemed appropriate to name it after a song about the city.  Think of music about London and a few come to mind straightaway – stuff by Roots Manuva and Skinnyman, the Stones’ ‘Rain Falls Down’, various tunes by Bloc Party, and the Kinks’ Waterloo Sunset. And London Calling, perhaps above all others.

2. London Calling’s lyrics refer to the city’s growing nuclear obsession, and also about the end of the punk era and Beatlemania… but that still doesn’t quite explain that couplet up there. ‘London calling’ the phrase refers to the BBC World Service announcements at the time, but still these two lines are elusive. What does it mean??  What did ‘they’ say?? Who are ‘they’??  God knows.  I can only guess, speculate, impart my own meaning and enjoy the mystery. And that seems to me the joy of music in general – it’s so interpretative and personal, its lyrics and sounds so shadowy and rich with intrigue and triggers.  One person’s favourite song is the worst his neighbour has ever heard. Candle in the Wind can send some to tears and others to sleep. Just last night I read various websites arguing about New Order’s Love Vigilantes lyrics: is the soldier-narrator dead or alive?  It’s impossible to know – but such joy to be part of the discussion.  That’s what sucks us music fans in and keeps us coming back, begging for more. I hope this blog translates some of that joy.

3. This blog will probably spend most of its time talking about electro, hip-hop, mash-ups and generally all sorts of exciting alternativa; while devoting scant attention to this music’s forebears.  But that’s not to say I’m not aware much of modern music is influenced by previous genius, subconsciously or otherwise. In some cases it’s banal re-workings, and in others thrilling re-imaginations and next stages. I see (or rather hear) as much of The Clash in today’s music as any other past band, and this title honours that continuing influence.

4. London Calling’s exactly the sort of song I heard too much on Virgin Radio or Greatest Rock Songs-type compilations when I was small and New Kids On The Block were big (lord).  Meaning I hate it now. Except, in this case, I don’t – I still bloody love it. It’s a ball-grabbingly boisterous bundle of angry fun, the musical equivalent of a Ferrari and an open road, and it suits the thrasher that, let’s be honest, is in all of us. It’s the leather jacket of songs: heavy, never quite out of fashion, handsome and effortlessly cool.

There we go – I hope some of that makes some lousy sense.

MP3:
The Clash – London Calling (zSHARE)

Purchase Links:
London Calling (album)

Best Shoreditch Gig Venue?

To get things moving, here’s a poll on an oft-discussed subject.  Risking readerly consternation and geographical humiliation (I’ve stuck to the Triangle, but sauntered a little way up Kingsland Rd and into Hoxton), here’s a list of Shoreditch gig venues.  Considering the quality of regular line-up, the sound, the service, the price of a shandy and the quota of cowboy shirts on display, which is your favourite venue for hearing live music?  Vote now or forever hold your peace, man…

[polldaddy poll=1696618]

I’ll publish the results when enough people have voted that I can respectably call this a survey.  As this is the first one and I’m Bloggy No Mates, that could be a wee while…

Welcome!

Greetings webling! You have landed on Some Of It Was True!, a London-based music blog. While I don’t intend to limit myself to music produced or performed in my capital city, Some Of It Was True! will definitely have a focus on things I’ve seen, heard or been tipped off about in the Big Smoke. I’ll try and update this regularly, but feel free to write and tell me that I’m being a lazy toerag, that I’ve lost my way or that I’ve sold my soul to Katy Perry or, worse, La Roux. Be kind though: I might have a journalism diploma and pen the occasional film review, but I’m no professional writer and certainly not a music critic.  At the end of the day and once the fat lady (sorry - The Gossip) has sung, I’m just expressing my opinion and you will agree or disagree, and we go from there.  I guess that’s the beauty of blogging.  Anyway, hope you like what follows…

Richard.