Dig Your Motherland Circus (July 8th - 12th)

Hello and welcome to Work Tunes.

It seems like every week I am having to rush through picking a playlist these days. I've just returned from the usual shopping expedition and have forgotten a bunch of stuff, so I'll be off out again soon. While I am at home though, let's see what we have.

Before Portlandia and Wild Flag, the lovely Carrie Brownstein was in Sleater-Kinney, so check them out. Thanks to my SOTW this week, Raw Power gets a gig. Thanks to Jamie's SOTW from a couple of weeks ago, so does Dave Brubeck's immortal jazz classic Time Out. For a helping of newness, there's Editors and Bliss n Eso. Representing classic Australian rock, I've got the Easybeats only disc of Easy Fever, a tribute album. On old favourite from two or three years ago from Beach Fossils is here. From Hip Hop DJ Steinski, there's a retrospective. Natalie Merchant steps up with an album I haven't heard yet. Finally, what playlist would be complete without a good 80s compilation?

Check it out:

• Sleater-Kinney - Dig Me Out
• Natalie Merchant - Motherland
• Editors - Weight Of Your Love
• VA - Eighties Complete Vol. 1 (1980-1982)
• Iggy & The Stooges - Raw Power
• Steinski - What Does It All Mean? (1983 - 2006 Retrospective)
• Bliss n Eso - Circus In The Sky
• The Dave Brubeck Quartet - Time Out
• The Easybeats - Easy Fever 
• Beach Fossils - What A Pleasure

Top Five Artists Last Week

1. Josh Rouse
2. The Lemonheads
3. Son Volt
4. David Bowie
5. Chelsea Light Moving

Song of the Week : Iggy & the Stooges - Gimme Danger

Last night I went to Opening Night at Rev and watched Burn; a documentary about the Detroit Fire Department. There are something like 80,000 vacant homes in Detroit and parts of it look just like a war zone a la downtown NY in the 70s. There are also a lot of arson attacks in Detroit, on vacant and occupied homes.

My SOTW is a tune the doco makers used in the opening scenes of Burn, to great effect - Gimme Danger by Iggy & The Stooges. Its abrasive fuzziness and the dark bass undertone really went well with footage of firemen standing inside burning buildings, shooting water OUT! These guys love a good fire and the starting salary is just 30k! I wouldn't push trolleys for 30k let alone put my life on the line. And there are dangers I didn't even think of - such as second story floors burning through, dropping giant bathtubs and air conditioners on their heads, or being trapped under collapsed facades.  

I'm sorry I only have a low bitrate version on my iPod of the track off Raw Power as the CD is at home. The only other version I have is from the Iggy Pop Nude & Rude compilation and that's a whole other mix. Somebody polished all the edges up so it sounds hollow. This original version has all the crunch and attack of a five alarm fire. Turn it up!

Paalam

It's almost time to head off out again. If you're in Perth this week, don't forget that Revelation Film Festival is on. There's a bunch of great films, including music documentaries like the one on Big Star and one on Muscle Shoals. Get down and support independent filmmakers, indie cinemas and film nerds like myself. 

Hasala malakim.

Blackbyrds Clash the Sky Road (February 18th - 22nd)

Hello and welcome to Work Tunes.

Well the company website I designed and wrote has launched, so you'd think things would be slowing down for me. But no, now I have a newsletter to make and a conference greedy for collateral to plan.Good thing there's music to get me through the work-a-day grind - which is exactly why I started writing all these lists down.

This week I have quite a few brand new releases, from Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds, Iceage and Beach Fossils. The ACBs who I'd never heard of, gave their Stona Rosa album away for free, so that is here. I just discovered a fantastic band that the recently deceased Donald Byrd had played in, The Blackbyrds. I also have The Hard Road, which I was certain had been on a hundred lists already, but no. There's J Mascis and early Margot & the Nuclear So and So's; as well as The Smiths and classic Ice-T. 

Check it out:

• The ACBs - Stona Rosa
• Beach Fossils - Clash The Truth
• The Blackbyrds - Happy Music: The Best Of the Blackbyrds
• Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds - Push The Sky Away
• Ice-T - Power
• The Smiths - Strangeways Here We Come
• Margot & the Nuclear So and So's - The Dust Of Retreat
• J Mascis - Several Shades of Why
• Hilltop Hoods - The Hard Road
  
• Iceage - You're Nothing

Top Five Artists Last Week

1. Gil Scott-Heron
2. The Weepies
3. Dinosaur Jr.
4. Wilco
5. Belly

Song of the Week : The Avett Brothers - Live And Die

Yesterday being Valentine's Day, I of course showered my lovely wife with gifts. One of those gifts was a mixtape I threw together on one single premise. We happened to catch a Mumford & Sons clip on Rage last Saturday morning and she mentioned she "liked their sound". So I grabbed a bunch of bands including Mumford and Iron & Wine, Bon Iver and The Avett Brothers and stuck them on a CD to show her there was in fact an actual sound like that going around. I called the mix Folky Hipsters.

Today's SOTW is the track I used to close out the mix. The Avett Brothers - Live and Die which appears on the soundtrack to the film This Is 40. The awfulness of that film being released the year I turned 40 was not lost on me.

The song is pretty upbeat and extra hoedowny with that banjo and the jangly percussion. I thought Mrs Corey J would like it because it is jaunty and she isn't often one for maudlin folk tunes - unlike yours truly.

Ciao for Niao

Thanks for stopping by. I think I'll be catching Django Unchained this weekend, so maybe look for a review soon on MFNM.

Until then, as always, hasala malakim.

Short Beach Pixies Give Up (April 30 - May 4)

Hello and welcome to Work Tunes.


I've got a biannual Record Fair this weekend and I'm looking forward to picking up a few great records at a bargain price - or a couple of hard to find classics at a premium. If I find anything especially great, I might just rip it to digital and whack it on next week's list. 


This week's list is a little heavy on the indie and the dinosaur rock. I've found a couple of bands I didn't previously know and dug up a Television album I haven't heard. Here's what I have to get me through week ahead. 


After getting quickly addicted to the What A Pleasure EP, I've got Beach Fossils' debut; Songl told me Spectrals were like Beach Fossils, so there's that; I have one of the last Bonnie Prince Billy albums I'm yet to hear; the best of the Pixies; The Postal Service's one and only album; some funky jazz hop from Ninety One; the second disc of Tupac's Greatest Hits; some Iron & Wine and U2's Boy.


Check it out:

• U2 - Boy
• Television - The Blow Up
• Tupac - Greatest Hits (Disc 2)
• Spectrals - Bad Penny
• Beach Fossils - Beach Fossils
• Bonnie "Prince" Billy - The Letting Go
• Ninety One - Short Nights
• Pixies - Wave Of Mutilation
• Iron & Wine - Our Endless Numbered Days
• The Postal Service - Give Up

Top Five Artists Last Week

1. Beach Fossils
2. Snoop Dogg
3. Brian Eno
4. Ambulance LTD
5. Ninety One

Song of the Week : Beach Fossils - Face It

I first heard this album (which is really an EP) half way through last year and it just sort of washed right over me. You know, I enjoyed it but it didn’t really make an impact. I think that’s because I wasn’t listening too close and because the music feels like a long lazy swim or somebody scoring your daydreams.


This track is Face It and it’s been stuck in my head all week. Not sure if it’s because we have been thinking about moving to Darlington (and the refrain says “I’d give up the city life”) or because my wife left the country for me (and it says “I’d give up the country life”) but I feel like I can relate to the song and I’ve been constantly singing and humming it. Plus, I’ve played the What A Pleasure EP at least three times since ANZAC night. 


I think if you took the massive reverb off the vocals and crunched up the guitars a little, the whole EP would pretty much rock out. But instead the sound has been filtered through almost a Vaseline lens.


I’ve since grabbed their debut to check it out and that will be on the playlist for next week. If you like the sound of this track, definitely check out What A Pleasure.

Arrivederci

So there you have it. From a personal stand point, not a bad list to take with me on another busy week. Hopefully there's something you haven't heard that you can check out and get into. I'll be at the record fair Sunday, looking for new gems. I'll let you know if I find any.  


Ciao for now. Go Eagles! Hasala malakim.

Playlist : March 14th - 18th, 2011

Hello and welcome to another pared down version of Work Tunes.

This week there's a couple of new artists for me in Blind Pilot and Jack Johnson. Yes, I have honestly heard no Jack Johnson (well apart from that song he did where Ben Stiller was in the film clip). I'm also looking forward to the remix version of Gil Scott-Heron's 2010 release I'm New Here - done by Jamie XX and called We're New Here.

This is what it all looks like.

• Jack Johnson - To The Sea
• Beach Fossils – What A Pleasure
• Hilltop Hoods - A Matter Of Time
• Train of Thought - Moving Heads
• J Mascis - Several Shades of Why
• REM - Collapse Into Now
• The Murmurs - Pristine Smut
• Vetiver - To Find Me Gone
• Gil Scott-Heron and Jamie XX - We're New Here
• Blind Pilot - 3 Rounds and a Sound

Top 5 Artists Last Week

1. Dolorean
2. Snoop Doggy Dog
3. Tori Amos
4. Sonic Youth
5. Mellow Drum Addict

Song of the Week : Dolorean - Country Clutter

I know a couple weeks back in a daze of being newly smitten with Dolorean I picked one of their songs. It was a good song, but probably not a good representation of them. The other day, my copy of their latest album The Unfazed arrived. This track, Country Clutter is more true to why I really like them. It’s interesting how it shuffles along in a bit of a death march as well as building at points like it’s about to kick the distortion pedal on. Lyrically, it’s honest and angry and a little bit bitter, which I always like. Enjoy!

Postscript

Most of this post was cobbled together prior to today. I saved this draft before hearing about the earthquake in Japan. I debated whether to just post it without acknowledging that tragedy, but I just couldn't do it.

The footage I've seen tonight is impossible to ignore. The thick slow sludge of the ocean around Sendai swallowing the farm lands and the vast tracts of sheds; sweeping houses and vehicles and fences along, like some cheesy black blob from a 1950s sci-fi film. I'm not one for prayer, but I do hope with every ounce of my own being that no more lives are lost. The last I heard, more than 200 bodies had washed up on the beach. It's terrifying and horrid and all too big to fathom. 200 lives or 200,000+ as on Boxing Day, 2002, it makes no difference; one is too many.

起死回生 kishi kaisei :

Wake from death and return to life.