Donnas Exposed Monster Beats (September 2nd - 6th)

Hello and welcome to Work Tunes.

After a terrible rookie mistake, I am spending my late Saturday afternoon recovering deleted TV shows from an external disc. There's a reason we invented confirmation prompts and unfortunately I didn't take the time to really consider my response. Do you really want to permanently delete your TV shows Corey? Do you really? So now, one folder at a time, I'm running a recovery program on it. HandyRecovery - I can't recommend it enough, obviously. But never mind all that now, to the music.

It has been so long since I heard Monster that I'd forgotten the track list. I recently bought an Alt Country double compilation, so disc one is here; and I dragged Gillian Welch along for the ride to compliment it. I can't ever get enough Tribe and I think it was Harry Allen who recommended Talib Kweli & Hi Tek's LP. Just the one new album this week, but what a new one, from the gorgeous Neko Case. More ol friends on the bill come from Dinosaur Jr, The Donnas and Paul Kelly. Finally, because I couldn't stop humming Feel Like Makin' Love complete with air guitar riffing (I think that's a complex part of my current 70s muscle car fascination), I have the best of Bad Company.

Check it out:

• R.E.M. - Monster
• VA - Exposed Roots - Best of Alt Country (Disc 1)
• Gillian Welch - Revival
• Talib Kweli & Hi Tek - Reflection Eternal
• Paul Kelly - Deeper Water
• A Tribe Called Quest - Beats, Rhymes and Life
• The Donnas - Spend the Night
• Bad Company - 10 from 6 (Greatest Hits)
• Dinosaur Jr. - Farm
• Neko Case - The Worse Things Get...

Top Five Artists Last Week

1. Giorgio Moroder
2. Björk
3. The Cranberries
4. Savages
5. Steve Earle & The Dukes (And Duchesses)

Song of the Week : Pond  - Hobo Rocket

I've never paid much attention to Tame Impala, so when I found Pond on NPR, I wasn't aware of the connection or that Pond had already had albums out. All I knew was there was a Perth band getting noticed in the US even if it was by public radio. 

The album Hobo Rocket is an enjoyable listen and I picked the title track because it's a bit of fun. The vocals are done by some guy named Cowboy John who is meant to be a Perth fixture (I'm sure one of you will be able to fill in the uninitiated?!) 

His singing sounds like Eddy Vedder pretending to be a bum. The song is a psychedelic freak out of a jam session with a sort of homeless grunge rap. 

अलविदा

A Happy Father's Day for us breeders in Australia for tomorrow. I hope there's some quality family time and some vinyl involved - well for me at least. 

Hasala malakim.

No Immaculate Disco Rocket (August 26th - 30th)

Hello and welcome to Work Tunes.

Saturday is almost half way done. My internet is still on the dodgy side of sketchy. I'm hoping to write this all out, get it posted and get out again before it dies. 


Thanks to the disco groove that Daft Punk have injected into the world this year  I've got Giorgio Moroder. I heard some good things about Steve Earle, Perth band Pond and Savages, so I'm checking them all out. In the "it's been a while" corner, you'll find Aloe Blacc and The Cranberries. More good reviews for an old Curren$y record got that a gig and Pegz is here for my Skip Hop fix. I've got a Best Of for Bjork to ice(land) it up a little and lastly, a Mojo compilation full of Sub Pop tracks I picked up for $3 on eBay. God bless eBay.

Check it out:

• Aloe Blacc - Good Things
• Pond - Hobo Rocket
• Pegz - Capricorn Cat
• Curren$y - The Stoned Immaculate
• VA - Mojo Presents Sub Pop 300
• Giorgio – Best of Electronic Disco
• Bjork - Greatest Hits
• Savages - Silence Yourself
• Steve Earle & The Dukes (And Duchesses) – The Low Highway
• The Cranberries - No Need To Argue

Top Five Artists Last Week

1. Bob Dylan
2. KISS
3. Big Star
4. 50 Cent
5. Joshua Radin

Song of the Week : The Bee Gees  - Stayin' Alive

Ahead of my SOTW, let me apologise in advance for the over-representation of the 1970s in my picks lately; but in my defense  even the stuff from 2013 that I’m listening to sounds like it’s from there (I’m looking at you Daft Punk, Orgone, Charles Bradley et al!). Having said that, this is definitely not a 2013 track, although it is timeless. 

I defy anyone not to feel a strut in their bones when this track starts at high volume. From the funkiest white boy bass line of all time, to the ball-rippingly high falsettos, Stayin’ Alive is the absolute bomb. This is the version from the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack which I have 2 copies of on vinyl because one is a little scratched from back in the day and the other I bought cheap at a fair. 

I picked it because I recently spent a while listening to a smart playlist which was all high rated 70s songs – called of course Super Sounds of the Seventies. I hadn’t heard Stayin’ Alive for a while and I was surprised how good it sounded. It really is as funky as I think it is possible for a white guy to write. I had it on in the car on the weekend and my good mate 2ompkins (who is a bass player) said “Best. Bassline. Ever” and he hates the Bee Gees, though he is part disco fan. 

It’s catchy, it’s fun, it’s produced beautifully; it’s just a terrific track. So overboard Seventies or not, Stayin’ Alive is my SOTW jam.

Ciao 

I think I still have internet. I could be wrong by the time I hit Publish. Wherever you go this weekend, take some tunes.

Hasala malakim.

Platinum Radio Wax Renaissance (August 19th - 23rd)

Hello and welcome to Work Tunes.

It's late Saturday night and I am just sitting down to write. It's been another long day. I got all negative test results today, so that's positive... ha ha. The doctor asked me today if I had any compulsive behaviours; alcohol, food, biting my nails etc. I told him about the only thing I was addicted to was making playlists on my iPod. And here's another one for you.

Because I dug on In The Street for SOTW last week, there's Big Star. I've been meaning to play some Stevie Wonder, so one of his best is here. Kiss add another 70s dose to my list, Bob Dylan reps the 60s and Hank Williams takes us back into the 50s. For relatively new stuff there's the soulful R&B of Valerie June and something else from Joshua Radin. My weekly serve of Hip Hop comes from 50 Cent and Q-Tip. Last of all I have the soundtrack from one of my favourite films, Waking Life, which is a sort of classical requiem for a dream.

Check it out:

• Big Star - Radio City
• Hank Williams - Best Of Hank Williams
• Bob Dylan - Biograph (Disc 3)
• VA - Waking Life OST
• Joshua Radin - Wax WIngs
• Kiss - Double Platinum
• Stevie Wonder - Innervisions
• Q-Tip - The Renaissance
• 50 Cent - Get Rich or Die Tryin'
• Valerie June – Pushin’ Against A Stone

Top Five Artists Last Week

1. Orgone
2. Bob Dylan
3. Prince
4. The Handsome Family
5. Blind Pilot

Song of the Week : Big Star - In The Street

My song this week comes from the soundtrack to a documentary about Big Star. You’ll be familiar with the song if you ever watched an episode of That 70s Show; they use it in a modified version for their theme song. 

In The Street is rock song about bored kids. It has that feel of bored, lost and nihilist teens. That’s an odd thing, given its from 1972 and (in Australia at least) the post-60s hangover was still around. I don’t tend to equate slacking with the 60s kids, who seem over earnest and naïve as opposed to cynical and bored – if the way Hollywood portrays them is to be believed. The attitude on show in In the Street seems like it belongs a good 5 years later in ’77 with the punks. It’s a feeling I knew as a teen in the 80s, a uni student in the 90s and sometimes a cynical old man in the Two-Tens! 

Musically, there is a lovely bit of cow bell in there to go with a few killer guitar licks and a whole lot of noise. Alex Chilton sings in a whine like a brat and it all makes sense. I think it was gold that the used it for That 70s Show, but I noticed they changed the line about the joint to “We’re All Alright!” Much like the show tiptoes around its drug use. 

I chose the documentary mix just so you’d get a different version of it. The difference seems to just be in the polish. I can imagine this mix would sound better in a theatre than the original because the original is a bit more abrasive in the high end. 

Goodnight

It's time for me to watch the latest Futurama and then go to bed with Brett Easton Ellis. Fun times planned tomorrow. A fuse blew in our FM transmitter though, so I may be forced to make a mix CD for the car tomorrow. It's like living in a developing nation in a way. 

Hasala malakim.

Handsome Blind Horrowshow Mystery (August 12th - 16th)

Hello and welcome to Work Tunes.

After a solid day of blood tests, grocery shopping, birthday party preparation, swimming lessons and korma making, I'm drafting this post at midnight while casually watching an episode of Drunk History. The good news is I had the list thrown together earlier in the week.

Besides the second disc of Biograph, there's an old favourite from Blind Pilot, the new Civil Wars and Ariel Pink's Before Today. From the grimiest depths of the 90s comes Mystery Machine and Prince's Diamonds & Pearls. Too much Orgone has been not nearly enough lately, so I've got Killion Floor from 2007. I read some interesting things about Kip Moore recently, so I thought I'd check him out. Two more new albums round out this week's list, from AUS rapper Horrorshow and alt country veterans The Handsome Family.

Check it out:

• Blind Pilot - 3 Rounds and a Sound
• Mystery Machine - Glazed
• Bob Dylan - Biograph (Disc 2)
• Prince - Diamonds & Pearls
• Orgone - Killion Floor
• Horrorshow - King Amongst Many
• The Civil Wars - The Civil Wars
• The Handsome Family - Wilderness
• Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti - Before Today
• Kip Moore - Up All Night

Top Five Artists Last Week

1. Laura Marling
2. Bob Dylan
3. Red Hot Chili Peppers
4. Sex Pistols
5. Charles Bradley

Song of the Week : Beth Orton - Concrete Sky

From Beth Orton’s Daybreaker album this track Concrete Sky was written by Johnny Marr and features backing vocals by the one and only Ryan “Sean Hannity Hates Me” Adams. 

I think the fact that Marr wrote it is well on display. The sparkling melody and the brittle jangle of acoustic picking is signature. Ryan and Orton were an item when this was recorded (I think, or shortly after) and she is of course the “Tall drink of water” in English Girls. 

As far as the lyrics go, I like the image of a ‘concrete sky falling from the trees’. It’s one that paints a picture of heavy burden and pressure. Yet the melody completely betrays the ‘heaviness’ of the subject because it’s so sweet and catchy.  The harmony between the voices is not quite perfect and that makes it beyond brilliant. There’s weariness and heaviness in them. 

Five Thousand

If you know why Five Thousand means goodbye, you and I are tight, son. And that being the case, you should definitely check out Orgone, because everybody deserves a proper funking.

Hasala malakim.

Written Anti Eagle Pistols (August 5th - 9th)

Hello and welcome to Work Tunes.

It's another glorious "Winter" Saturday in Perth today and I've so far been stuck at a doctor's surgery, at shopping and soon at an indoor swimming pool. There's not much chance of making the most of today's sunshine, so tomorrow had better be just as nice - and what do you know, it is forecast to be. There are some positives about this city, it can't be denied. 

So what have I got for my listening pleasure next week? It was so good to hear the My Girl soundtrack last week, that I've got The Big Chill this time. Another compilation comes from Noisetrade and Anti Records. Some neglected albums again make the list; namely the first of 3 discs from Dylan's Biograph, the Sex Pistols' one and only Bollocks and Californication from the Chili Peppers. Sliding in nicely next to the Soul of The Big Chill is the first Charles Bradley album, because last week's listen of Victim Of Love just wasn't enough. I'm checking out Laura Marling after Rolling Stone called her the new Joni Mitchell; and Tori Amos' bonus LP from the Under The Pink tour should compliment Marling nicely. For my Rap fix, there's Nas. Lastly, I've included the new Ben Lee album, which I actually donated to Kickstart for. It's a weird kind of ambient thing and I wanted to give it another chance; because frankly it creeped me out the first time.  

Check it out:

• Sex Pistols - Never Mind The Bollocks... Here's The Sex Pistols
• Bob Dylan - Biograph (Disc 1)
• Laura Marling - Once I Was An Eagle
• Red Hot Chili Peppers - Californication
• VA - Noisetrade: Anti Records Summer Sampler
• Charles Bradley - No Time For Dreaming
• VA - Big Chill OST
• Ben Lee - Ayahuasca: Welcome To The Work
• Tori Amos - More Pink
• Nas - It Was Written

Top Five Artists Last Week

1. Nirvana
2. Orgone
3. Mazzy Star
4. Pearl Jam
5. R.E.M.

Song of the Week : Orgone - Strike (feat. Niki Crawfod)

This week has been hard to pick a SOTW because I’ve been a bit down due to being sick and sore. And when I get like that, I tend to cling to tunes I know and love that make me feel good. Which is all well and good, but doesn't make for an interesting SOTW. So I am deliberately choosing a new song (even if it sounds old). 

A little while ago I found a band called Orgone. They are a funk and r&b band who do a lot of instrumentals. The first album I heard from them, Fuzzed Up, sounds like the soundtrack to a Troy McLure 70s car chase film! Recently they released a new album called New You.  This time it’s not all instrumentals. There’s a bunch of guest female singers. What that sounds like added to 70s car chase music is a 70s Blaxploitation disco action flick. Something like Car Wash or Superfly TNT or Fioxy Brown. 

This song is Strike (feat. Niki Crawford) and it is jam packed with funky horns and a badassssss bassline for some wah wah to play around on. Ms Crawford sounds like Beyonce took lessons from Anita Baker and Mavis Staples. I can see this being the montage song from a film about workers who take over a factory in protest at conditions in 1970s Detroit. I hope you dig it, brothers and sisters.

Ciao
Well it's time for swimming soon and then I've got to race back to watch what might be the last West Coast win for Season 2013. I say we forget this year happened at all and next year the Eagles who turned up in 2011 and most of 2012 can get on the park again. Sound good? Cool. 

Hasala malakim.