Life Is Written In You

Having been listening to Kristin Hersh, it was perhaps inevitable that I would also be drawn to the music of Tanya Donnelly, born a few weeks earlier on 14th July 1966. Belated happy birthday, Tanya!

Tanya and Kristin first met and became friends in the 1970s, around age 8. They became step-sisters in the 1980s, when Tanya's father married Kristin's mother. 

Another significant milestone was 1981, when Tanya and Kristin formed Throwing Muses. Tanya's gone on to have a remarkable career since, with The Breeders, Belly, and a impressive run of solo albums and EPs.

Mirroring yesterday's post, here's a short selection of Tanya's solo releases, although 'official videos' are much harder to find, beyond her first couple of albums on 4AD. I've omitted The Breeders as none featured Tanya on lead vocals, but I have included a couple of classics from Belly and Throwing Muses. 

 

Oh, and Tanya also had new music out in April this year, a new song called Golden Cut, written and recorded with Gabi Lima. It's a cracker.

 

I'd also highly recommend exploring Tanya's Bandcamp page, as you will find tonnes of music, including the entire Swan Song Series of EPs and 'lockdown' cover versions of Bob Marley & The Wailers, Yazoo and Pixies as name your price/free downloads.

The Bright Light (1997)

Keeping You (2001)

Mass Ave (Pandora Whiteboard Sessions) (2013)*

Three Little Birds (Cover of Bob): Tanya Donnelly ft. Grace Bee Fisher & Harriet Pearl Fisher (2020) **

Big Love Bends Time (Live @ The Town & City Festival, Lowell, Massachusetts): Tanya Donnelly & Friends (2022)

Gepetto: Belly (1992)

Not Too Soon: Throwing Muses (1990)

Golden Cut: Tanya Donnelly & Gabi LIma (2024)

An incredible and treasured talent.

 

* I found what appears to be an official video for Mass Ave on YouTube but the channel itself ("Brian") is unavailable, so I'm not sure if this link will work.  

** Grace and Harriet are Tanya's daughters, born 1999 and 2006 respectively.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In My Dream

Happy birthday to Kristin Hersh, born 7th August 1966.

It was only when I had the thought of compiling a Dubhed selection for this singular talent that I realised that I haven't digitised my Kristen Hersh and Throwing Muses CDs (and I don't as yet have any albums by her other band, 50 Foot Wave). 

So instead here's a short selection of 'official videos' mostly covering her solo releases but throwing in a couple of band efforts towards the end. Oh, and in April Kristin released an EP of sessions from her 2023 album Clear Pond Road, so I've included the closing song (and Bandcamp llink) to that as well.

Your Ghost (ft. Michael Stipe) (1993)

A Loon (Strings Version) (1994)

Echo (1999)

In Shock (2007)

Ms Haha (2023)

Counting Backwards: Throwing Muses (1991)

Staring Into The Sun: 50 Foot Wave (2022)

Palmetto (Clear Pond Session) (2024)

Have a great one, Kristin!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pump Up My Heart

Ooh, loving this. Dan Snaith aka Caribou has just released his own version of/tribute to the M/A/R/R/S classic, truncating the title to simply Volume.

Dan's been on a bit of a roll, releasing Broke My Heart in June and following it up in July with a brace of remixes by Harry Hayes and Champion aka Reiss Hanson.

On the strength of these bangers, the forthcoming album (I'm assuming there is one!) will be... best played loud.

 

 

Hold The Rail

Simon Fisher Turner is a musician, songwriter, composer, producer, and actor who has released somewhere in the region of 50 albums in his long and varied career.

 

The latest, Instability of the Signal, was released last Friday and was accompanied by a new single and video, Toast. Apparently this is the fifth single to date though I have managed to miss the previous four in the past three months.

Simon Fisher Turner “In brilliant blue pyjamas, with a garage full of props," describes director John Lee Bird, "this is what happens when two friends have two hours to lark around.”

 

Playing with handheld camera and standard video effects software, it's a good fit with the minimalist soundscape and almost childlike vocals.

 

"I love my comics

But it's not reading my mum would say

You need some Shakespeare

You need a classic

Proper books"

 

A slight spoiler/warning in that the featured comic, an issue of long-running pocket book anthology Commando, does not survive the making of this video.

 

A great song to start the week. 

My introduction to Simon - then minus the Fisher - came in 1991, via a couple of budget priced compilations on the Creation label. Both A Palace In The Sun and American Pensioners On Ecstasy featured the same song, a 12-minute epic titled Dark Melt.

I subsequently discovered that Simon had been a child actor, including a role with Robert Mitchum in the 1971 remake of The Big Sleep, and a would-be teen pop idol mentored by Jonathan King. His self-titled debut album in 1973 featured several cover versions, such as this David Bowie classic.

My stumbling across Simon's music in 1991 coincided with my awareness of his work as a composer for films, notably the work of Derek Jarman between 1986 and 1993, from Caravaggio to Jarman's final work, Blue. 

 

Since that time, Simon has had a long relationship with Mute Records, who have issued many of his albums in the 21st century.

 

In 2020, Simon Fisher Turner collaborated with Edmund de Waal on A Quiet Corner in Time, Two years later, a reworked album built around the title track was released. Sub-titled (Exquisite Corpse), the premise is that an artist reworks the song before passing it on to another artist to do the same, and so on and so on. This is repeated nine times before the song, unrecognisable from it's point of origin, is returned to Simon Fisher Turner for a final de/reconstruction.

 

This is the penultimate track, Maps' remix of a remix of a remix of a remix of a remix of a remix of a remix of a remix. 

 
A Quiet Corner in Time (Exquisite Corpse) includes remixes by Nik Colk Void, Polly Scattergood, Alessandro Cortini and Yann Tiersen. It's available as a free download but a charitable donation to United24, the official fundraising platform of Ukraine, is requested.

Back to Instability of the Signal, one of the inspirations for the album is the writer Harold Pinter and two of his verses are set to music.

 

Democracy was published in 2003 and is four lines

There's no escape.
The big pricks are out.
They'll fuck everything in sight.
Watch your back.

 

The "Special Relationship" dates from 2005 and is equally blunt and crude in it's commentary on war (then specifically, the conflict in Iraq).

 
 
An unintentional rabbit hole, as I was initially drawn to the brevity and levity of Simon's latest single but the latter pieces resonate with the madness of the last months and years. 

Maybe I should have gone for this Toast or that Toast instead....

We Can’t Deal With Culture We Don’t Understand

The news that there had been rioting, violence and looting following the tragedy in Southport was sadly not surprising. 

 

And when media outlets reported incidents "across the UK", in fact it appeared to be concentrated in England, with Belfast making the news but no mention of similar disturbances in Scotland and Wales, as far as I could see.

I was also sad to see Bristol named as one of the cities but then, given it's prominent anti-racist activity, it's often been a magnet for the far right. And goodness knows we have enough of the morons who were born and "bred" in the city. I grew up with, lived in the same street as and worked with a fair few of them. 

The Sky News screen grab above features a few of these fine examples of homo moronus in Bristol on Saturday, facing off against the police. Maybe you recognise some of them. If you happen to serve them at a cafe or takeaway any time soon, hawk a big flob into their food or drink with pleasure.

 

The mobs are described in the news reports as "protesters". That's far too kind a word for them. As a group gathered at a city centre hotel, I assume in the hope of forcing any immigrants within to go back where they came from, a larger group blocked them, chanting, "We are many, you are few. We are Bristol, who are you?"

 

There seems to have been some needless social media ripostes about how many of the counter group were in fact from Bristol, which I think is missing the point, or at the very least missing the scene from this classic film. On Saturday, those who turned up to challenge hate and violence were all Bristolian. 

 

I hadn't planned to write this when I started today's selection, it was supposed to be an fairly innocuous round up of some 2024 musical highlights that I haven't covered in previous posts. The post title is a line from one of the featured songs, Too Muchroom by David Holmes and Raven Violet. That, and a sense of horror at the TV news reports, seem to have guided my fingers at the keyboards as I started to type.

 

You may read some deeper meaning into some of the music choices today but I promise that any themes or connections are purely coincidental. What does link them however is that they represent what continues to be a great year, aurally speaking.

 

Fluke have been one of the comeback success stories of the year. Jack was released in May with another new song possibly titled Real Magnificent 'coming soon'. 

Jesse Fahnestock has never been away and here he is again, with two cracking collaborations, firstly with Emilia Harmony as Electric Blue Vision (and remixed by himself as 10:40). Then, Jesse returns to close the selection with his partner in crime Darren Bell as Jezebell, delivering the fruity tune Citric, freshly squeezed from their Weekend Machines EP.

Sean Johnston also makes a couple of appearances as Hardway Bros. Alessandro Sarsano aka DJALE remixes Functions For Machines from the excellent My Friends EP. Sean later reunites with Duncan Gray for another Hardway Bros Meet Monkton Uptown excursion, this time the aforementioned David Holmes and Raven Violet track.

Richard Norris released an exclusive 4-track EP (album?) in June, only available to subscribers, presenting music he'd created for a show at Paris Fashion Week. Each of the 4 mixes runs to nearly 14 minutes, so I've created a crude 8-minute edit of Mix 3 to include in this selection. 

I've been subscribing for a couple of years now. It's superb value for money and also raises funds for mental health charity MIND. I cannot recommend it enough.

Paris In The Summertime aside, Richard has a vast catalogue available on Bandcamp and in fact all of the music featured in today's selection is available to purchase there. If you like what you hear, go track them down, you will not be disappointed.

The penultimate song by Third Attempt samples from Louis Malle's 1981 film My Dinner With Andre

"You see, I keep thinking that what we need is a new language, 

a language of the heart."

 

The quoted lines are spoken by Andre Gregory, who appears opposite Wallace Shawn (if you don't know the latter's name, you will instantly recognise the face). The film is essentially two friends sharing anecdotes over a restaurant meal for the best part of two hours. They don't make 'em like that anymore. 

If you made it to the end of this post, many thanks for indulging me and I hope the music is sufficient compensation!

 

1) Jack: Fluke ft. Leah Cleaver (SW18 Sessions)

2) Trance Stance (1040s Haight Steppin Remix By Jesse Fahnestock): Electric Blue Vision (Trance Stance EP)

3) Hell Below: Acid Klaus ft. Lias Saoudi (P.T.S.D By Proxy EP)

4) Song Of Siraba (Mindbender Remix By Mårten Attling): A Space Age Freak Out (Shelter Me: In Crisis)

5) Paris In The Summertime (Mix 3 - Khayem's Olympic Edit): Richard Norris (Paris In The Summertime)

6) There’s Dust On It: Pye Corner Audio (There’s Dust On It EP)

7) Gold Rush (Dub): Break Mode ft. Nuri Orman (Boomarm Nation Family Album 2024)

8) Functions For Machines (DJALE Last Song Remix By Alessandro Sarsano): Hardway Bros (My Friends Remixes EP)

9) Waif Mentality: Orbury Common (Waif Mentality EP)

10) Too Muchroom (Hardway Bros Meet Monkton Uptown Remix By Sean Johnston & Duncan Gray): David Holmes ft. Raven Violet (Blind On A Galloping Horse (Remixes Vol. 2))

11) Language Of The Heart: Third Attempt (Offshore Sunsets EP)

12) Citric: Jezebell (Weekend Machines EP)

We Can’t Deal With Culture We Don’t Understand (1:09:56) (KF) (Mega)

True Love Will Find You In The End

Another discovery thanks to those wonderful folk at Last Night From Glasgow is Mark W. Georgsson.

As well as being a formidable talent in his own right, Mark also has the distinction of being the label's debut release in 2016, LNFG 1 being a 7" single of The Ballad Of The Nearly Man, backed with an Icelandic interpretation of the same. It's such a lovely tune that you get both versions on today's selection.

Since then, there has been an album and a couple of EPs, all consolidating Mark's talent for incorporating elements of country, folk, Celtic roots, Nordic nuances, ballads and barrelling rock with a tinge of psych. 

 

There's also a cover of It Could Only Happen To You, which I've since discovered is a cover version of an obscure B-side by The Jeevas. I'd forgotten all about them, to be honest, little wonder given that they were the band that Crispian Mills formed in the early 2000s in between stints in Kula Shaker. 

 

I had absolutely no interest in Kula Shaker, then or now, and I've no idea what the original song sounds like. However, Mark makes it his own, and I don't think that even my clumsy attempts to create an extended edit manage to screw it up.

This 45-minute selection pulls from all of Mark's existing releases, all of which are worth further investigation - and purchase - at the LNFG shop.

1) Bewildered (2023)

2) Rodeo (2016)

3) It Could Only Happen To You (Khayem's Blue Sunshine Edit) (Cover of The Jeevas) (2024)

4) Hanging Around (Single Version) (2020)

5) The Ballad Of The Nearly Man (Album Version ft. Katie McArthur) (2016)

6) Oh My Dear Friend (2016)

7) True Love (Single Version) (2020)

8) Nickel Or A Dime (2016)

9) Gleði (Joy) (Single Edit) (2023)

10) Forever Lonely Forever Blue (2016)

11) One Of A Kind (Instrumental) (2020)

12) Söngur Hins Mædda Manns (ft. Arnar Guðjónsson & Sigríður Thorlacius) (2016)

13) Things Have Changed (2023)

2016: Faces And Places: 2, 5, 6, 8, 10, 12

2020: Comes A Time EP: 4, 7

2020: Comes A Time (Instrumentals) EP: 11

2023: Things Have Changed EP: 1, 9, 13

2024: It Could Only Happen To You EP: 3

True Love Will Find You In The End (45:13) (KF) (Mega)

Frozen In A Red Light

Last Sunday (28th), Mrs. K and I ventured into the centre of Bristol to see Future Islands live in concert, one of only 4 UK dates to promote their seventh album, People Who Aren’t There Anymore.

 

The usual domestic and logistical challenges applied, which meant that we arrived at the Bristol Beacon just ahead of the main event but not in time to catch support act JOON aka Yasmin Kuymizakis.

 

I know very little about JOON, essentially a bit of 'research' into her music ahead of the show and most of it taken from her Bandcamp bio. JOON is a Maltese songwriter and producer who released her debut album, Dream Again, in 2021 and writes pop songs about alienation, optimism and believing that anything is possible, as evidenced on singles like E.T.. JOON also covered Just Can't Get Enough by Depeche Mode (with a fun video to boot) and Bananarama's Cruel Summer. I was sorry to have missed her set.

Mrs. K and I were in the standing area, but it was a sold-out show, with people crammed into the three levels of seating around the main stage. We picked a good spot mostly devoid of men with big hair over two metres tall, and wondered why one of the Rovers from cult 1960s TV show The Prisoner was propped up on stage.

We didn't have long to wait, as the band appeared and the unusual stage set up was revealed. Michael Lowry entered first from stage right, heading to the drum kit on the opposite side. William Cashion next, the shortest walk as he strapped on a bass guitar on the far right side. Gerrit Welmers appeared atop a cube structure to take position at the keyboards some ten feet above William. 

 

Finally, Samuel T. Herring came through an arched doorway in the cube, black jeans, black T-shirt, big smiles as the crowd roared their appreciation.

After a few words of introduction, Future Islands got straight into it with King Of Sweden, the opening song on People Who Aren’t There Anymore. The album came out in January and already the majority of the crowd in the stalls knew it word for word and joined in. I love the album, though clearly haven't put in the effort as far as the lyrics are concerned, so I subjected those in my immediate vicinity to my dancing instead. 

 

I have been known to mosh, but I've also perfected the art of expressive dancing 'on the spot' that doesn't encroach on anyone's personal space. Probably looks laughably po-faced, yet who cares when the music's urging you to move?

Two thirds of the current album were performed, yet spread throughout the 22-song set so there were regular dips into the back catalogue for long-time Future Islands, who seemed to be in the majority. 

There was no breakneck dash though songs; each one had a distinct beginning, middle and end with Samuel introducing every single song with some background or anecdote. He's also very generous with his staging and audience engagement. Not for him a fixed central point, with the occasional move to the left or right for a song, oh no. Samuel hurtles from one side to the other many times in each song, so regardless of your vantage point, you're guaranteed to have sight of him during the performance.

Samuel has clearly been taking notes from Andy McCluskey's stage craft, mirroring the O.M.D. legend's penchant for tapping his arm and chest as if he's trying to find a pulse or restart his heart. Samuel is also prone to some unusual choreography, and jokes at one point that with over a thousand gigs under his belt, Bristol is the only place where he's actually fallen off stage. (This is true and it happened at the O2 Academy in 2017) Thankfully, whilst the high kicks stayed in, there were no mishaps tonight.

The deceptively simple stage set works remarkably well, changing lights and angles and really making use of the projected silhouettes of the band, especially Gerrit Welmers, high up on his block.

 

Too many highlights to mention them all, and perhaps little surprise that Singles, 2014's breakthrough album - and first for 4AD - is the represented by four songs. Seasons (Waiting On You) came towards the end of the set and the audience had gone completely ape by this point. 

JOON made an appearance to sing with Samuel on Shadows. On the original album version, he duets with Debbie Harry, so almost impossibly big shoes for JOON to step into, but the song works well on stage.

 

It didn't matter that Mrs. K and I were largely unfamiliar with songs outside of the two albums, or that at times it was hard to understand what Samuel was saying or singing, it was a non-stop thrill from start to finish, guitar, synths, percussion and voice in perfect harmony. The hype about Future Island's live performances was deserved.

Following a short break and sustained applause and cheering, the band returned to the stage for an encore, all of which were completely new to Mrs. K and I. 

After a blistering, bass-driven second song, things then drop down to a musical hush as Samuel delivers a monologue about a song that the band wrote as 23 year old kids, heading from the skate park to the studio to make their first album. He tells us that whilst life changes, sometimes the very next day after writing a song, the song itself stays with you.

As with so many of Future Islands songs, the narrative deals with a relationship then active now long since ended. Samuel expresses that there were times when it was almost too painful to sing, but that it's been a staple set closer for many years. 

 

"One day we won't finish every set with this song", Samuel smiles. "But not today".

"The song's called Val Kilmer and the song's about someone I loved very very deeply many many years ago".

Only when we were driving home and I mentioned the unusual song title, Mrs. K laughed and told me that the song was actually called Little Dreamer...

An absolutely fantastic ninety minutes in the company of a band at the top of their game and an audience of new and deep-rooted Future Islands fans who experienced something truly special.

 

1) King Of Sweden (Album Version) (2024)

2) The Tower (Album Version) (2024)

3) A Dream Of You And Me (Album Version) (2014)

4) The Garden Wheel (Album Version) (2024)

5) Ran (Live @ KCRW) (2017)

6) Plastic Beach (Moss Of Aura Remix By Gerrit Welmers) (2021)

7) Peach (Album Version) (2024)

8) Light House (4AD Session) (2014)

9) Give Me The Ghost Back (Album Version) (2024)

10) The Sickness (Album Version) (2024)

11) City's Face (Album Version) (2020)

12) Like The Moon (Album Version) (2014)

13) Shadows (Album Version ft. Debbie Harry) (2017)

14) The Thief (Album Version) (2024)

15) For Sure (Washed Out Remix By Ernest Greene) (2021)

16) Say Goodbye (Album Version) (2024)

17) Seasons (Waiting On You) (Video Version) (2014)

18) Long Flight (Undressed Version) (2010)   

19) Tin Man (Extended Version By Chester Endersby Gwazda) (2010)

20) Ancient Water (Live @ KEXP) (2017) 

21) Vireo's Eye (2010)

22) Little Dreamer (Undressed Version) (2010)

 

2010: In Evening Air: 21

2010: In The Fall EP: 19

2010: Undressed EP: 18, 22

2014: 4AD Session: 8

2014: Singles: 3, 12, 17

2017: Live On KCRW (bootleg): 5

2017: Live On KEXP EP (bootleg): 20

2017: The Far Field: 13

2020: As Long As You Are: 11

2021: ALAYA Remixes EP 1-3: 6, 15

2024: People Who Aren’t There Anymore: 1, 2, 4, 7, 9, 10, 14, 16

 

Frozen In A Red Light (1:23:53) (KF) (Mega) 

 

 

As usual, I've had help with the visuals to accompany this post and my headline photo of the audience waiting for Future Islands to appear. 

Photos #2 and #5 were taken from fellow Bristolian Simon and posted on Twitter. The silhouette of Gerrit Welmers is a detail from another of Simon's photos.

Photo #4 was courtesy of Mrs. K, towards the end of the set.

Thanks all!

Re-Enter The Doors Of Perception

Side 2 of a cassette compilation of The Doors, recorded sometime during the spring/summer of 1992.

 

Music is often deeply rooted in memories and life experiences and this mixtape is a particularly good example. When I posted Side 1 last year, I wrote about my introduction to The Doors, the relationship that inspired this compilation, my wardrobe near-miss with a pair of leather trousers and the sad fate that befell this much-loved cassette. 

 

Writing this post has revived those memories once more, though the circumstances prompting it couldn't be more different. This is the first time I've played both sides of the (virtual) cassette in over three decades and I'm right back there, remembering how much I enjoyed putting this selection of songs together. 

 

At first glance, this side looks lazily recorded, as there are three pairs of sequential songs. 

 

Peace Frog and Blue Sunday were inevitable, as they segue together on the original album. I think I particularly wanted to include the former but there was no way of separating the two without creating a jarring end. That said, they go well together and I wouldn't have it any other way. 

 

Much as I like Spanish Caravan, there wasn't enough room on the tape to include all of the songs on my shortlist and I was especially taken by the opening section, which seemed to naturally dovetail into Hello, I Love You. 

 

The Crystal Ship and Break On Through? Well, they just sounded good together and I seemed to have a specific thing about not having the opening song from any of the albums as the first song on either side of the cassette.

 

The live mash up of Moonlight Drive and Horse Latitudes remains for me the best version of either, this alone a good enough reason for buying the odds and sods collection Alive She Cried.

 

The title track of The Soft Parade was another song that didn't make it intact onto my mixtape. Instead, I culled one of Jim Morrison's spoken word passages from the opening sequence, naming it You Cannot Petition The Lord With Prayer after the closing line. I knew little about The Doors back then, beyond what I'd heard via the vinyl albums, one mine, the rest borrowed from my friend Stuart. 

 

In subsequent years, I've read some of the background to the recording of the albums and Jim's variable state in the studio. Living in an era where artists' catalogues are constantly revived, remastered and reissued, often replete with every cough, belch and fart committed to tape, I've also got to hear Jim's multiple attempts to get to what - for this mixtape at least - ended up as a mere 35 seconds on record. 

 

The cassette was always going to end with The End. I mean, what else, really? It's still an astonishing piece of music and a 'long song' that I never tire of listening to. 

 

Today's post is dedicated to my beloved Uncle Mike, who passed away yesterday. To be honest, he might have preferred Dylan to The Doors, but maybe that's a memory for another day.
 
1) Love Her Madly (1971)

2) Touch Me (Album Version) (1969)

3) The Crystal Ship (Album Version) (1967)

4) Break On Through (To The Other Side) (Album Version) (1967)

5) Peace Frog (Album Version) (1970)

6) Blue Sunday (1970)

7) L.A. Woman (Album Version) (1971)

8) Spanish Caravan (Instrumental Intro) (1968)

9) Hello, I Love You (Album Version) (1968)

10) Moonlight Drive / Horse Latitudes (Live @ Felt Forum, New York) (1970)

11) You Cannot Petition The Lord With Prayer (Extract From 'The Soft Parade') (1969)

12) The End (Album Version) (1967)

1967: The Doors: 3, 4, 12

1968: Waiting For The Sun: 8, 9

1969: The Soft Parade: 2, 11

1970: Alive She Cried: 10

1970: Morrison Hotel: 5, 6

1971: L.A. Woman: 1, 7

Side Two (46:00) (KF) (Mega)

Side One is available here

And, for something a little bit different, here's a different take on The Doors that I posted exactly three years ago, on 1st August 2021...

Val Kilmer starred as Jim Morrison in Oliver Stone's 1991 film about The Doors. By sheer coincidence, there's a Val Kilmer reference in tomorrow's post, but you'll never guess what it is...