Showing posts with label the lemonheads. Show all posts
Showing posts with label the lemonheads. Show all posts

Saturday, October 5, 2013

Between Bigger Billboard Freaks (October 7th - 11th)

Hello and welcome to Work Tunes.

Something amazing happened today. I went grocery shopping and not a single person filled me with murderous rage. Not one. I think the key was spending a little time this morning before shopping at the library. Also, running into an old friend of the family's at Woolworths helped a bit. It's incredible what a difference a good run at the shops can make to your stress levels. I feel relaxed and refreshed. Highly unusual. 

Speaking of relaxed, this week's list was starting to look a little too crunchy so I threw Janis Ian and We Are Jeneric in to clear the palette  For a serve of bubblegum, there's a Billboard compilation for 1980; plus the classic Huey Lewis and the News album, Sports. Two crunchy albums from, can you believe it, 1987 that I didn't know about previously are from The Lemonheads and Pulp. Also here is the soundtrack to Before Sunrise/Before Sunset which I happily drove all the way back to Guildford to get after leaving it behind two weeks earlier. For more funky and soulful flavours there's LL Cool J and Slackwax. Lastly, for a little more crunch, I'm revisiting Last Splash from The Breeders.

Check it out:
  1. Bob Dylan
  2. Elvis Costello
  3. Counting Crows
  4. Arctic Monkeys
  5. Mazzy Star
Song of the Week : Yuck - Out Of Time


I was going to give you an Elvis Costello song from Spike, but then remembered he got the gig last week. So I've gone with something new instead. The band is Yuck, a UK outfit that released its self-titled first album in 2011. If you haven’t heard them, they’re kind of Pavement-y and a little grungy. They don’t sound English to me. 

This song Out Of Time is off their second album released last week, Glow & Behold. It’s best features are the jangling rhythm guitars, the lead guitar which follows the melody of the vocal and the slightly off-key vocals themselves. When it gets noisy is when it calls up the 90s. That grinding fuzz over melodic structure just puts the grunge in the tail.  It’s short and sweet and a bit gloriously sloppy, a really good soundtrack to a Friday in the office. 



До побачення

The big game last week turned out to be somewhat of a fizzer. While the lesser of two evils won (Hawthorn), the game itself was a mess and neither team really did anything inspiring. Since then though, football news has gone beserk with Lance Franklin leaving for Sydney for massive amounts of spoondoolah and, for Eagles fans at least, the new coach controversy with Adam Simpson chosen over favourite son and leading club goal kicker Peter Sumich. I'm personally happy to have Simpson on board, but do not have fond memories of the last time West Coast poached a Hawthorn person as coach. I'm not even going to say his name, lest it waken the spirits of curses past.

If you are at all interested in Australian Hip Hop, check out Hunter: For The Record. I chipped in to fund it via Pozible and recently watched my downloaded copy that was a reward for backers. Even if you're not into Hip Hop, actually, it's still a very raw and real look at a man going through the terrible torture of terminal illness. 

Rest in Power, MC Hunter. Hasala malakim.

Friday, March 8, 2013

Yep Bowie Surreal Indeed (March 11th - 15th)

Hello and welcome to Work Tunes.

Have you voted Western Australians? I was seriously contemplating not going to the polling booth and just paying the whopping $20 fine because a) I'm disillusioned with the state of State politics and b) don't nobody got time for that! But I did go; and thanks to the new "voting card" I was straight in and straight out. I actually didn't know too much about the independent candidates, but as I always do, I started with Family First last and worked my way to the top. 

Music-wise there's a whole stack of new stuff this week. First of all I have two free samplers from Yep Roc and Paste (their SXSW sampler). The other new albums come from diverse corners - there's folky hipster Josh Rouse; dead set legend David Bowie with a brand new classic; alt country heroes Son Volt and Thurston Moore's new band Chelsea Light Moving. For some hip hop I grabbed the John Legend and The Roots LP I haven't heard since I loved it in 2010 and an old favourite from Surreal & the Sound Providers. The Lemonheads get a guernsey and finally, so does Kathleen Edwards; both with favourites of mine. 

Check it out:


Top Five Artists Last Week
  1. Steve Miller Band
  2. Bilal
  3. The Pretenders
  4. Ben Folds
  5. Lou Reed

Song of the Week : Cold Chisel - Flame Trees


For my song of the week, my apologies that is so far out of left field, but it’s a track that only occurred to me on the way in this morning. 

The smart playlist I've made for the journey in picked Sara Blasko covering Flame Trees. Listening to it, I couldn't stop myself from hearing Chisel's original in my head. It made me realise that Flame Trees is a truly great song. I mean it. Really, really great. I think we disrespect it a lot for the bogan and ocker culture that has built up around it, but it is tremendous songwriting and probably the greatest vocal performance Barnes ever put down on tape. 

The suburban melodrama of the old home town pub and the footy mates and their reminiscing; plugged together with the domestic tragedy of a broken marriage puts the lyrics in the realm of workaday poetry. The grief in the song is given an extra injection of poignancy because it was Chisel's last mainstream hit (before the 'comeback' in the 90s). You take a part of the natural landscape, the flame tree, and you give that song a place; the feel of the open bush road and you make it uniquely small town Australia. The impassioned pleading in Jimmy’s vocal is not far off of Soul music and then he pushes it all aside with the broken down line of “who needs that sentimental bullshit, anyway?” 

As a nation, in general, Australia loves this song; and like a lot of the things we love collectively, we infuse it with a little bit of embarrassment and self-deprecation. Cultural cringe if you will. Not me. Not anymore. I've promised myself I will chase down the Tab for this on the weekend and give it a bash. I hope that my neighbours hear me and start swaying with their lighters in the air.


Cheerio

So, that's it, that's all, that's all there is. Have a cracking weekend and if you're a Perthie, may your guy win the election. Unless it's not my guy. Then, to hell with your guy. 

Hasala malakim.

Friday, November 16, 2012

10 Nebraska Gemini Killers (November 19th - 23rd)

Hello and welcome to Work Tunes.

It's Friday night and I'm getting this all done now before a big weekend visiting the In Laws. They have a lovely 5 acre patch of bushland but hardly any 3G coverage. I'm hoping to get in a bit of kayaking on the lake while I'm there, so that should keep me distracted from the Internet. Keeping me from getting distracted at work next week, I've got some sweet, sweet tunes.

I have the vast dichotomy of a collection of Ice Cube songs and Springsteen's homemade classic, Nebraska. A classic also from The Lemonheads. Because @sunky got me thinking about Wild Nothing, I'm playing Gemini; Los Angeles from LA punks X is here; you can thank Metal Evolution again for Van Halen. The final disc from The Motown Years is here, as is an Us3 album I only recently found. Patterson Hood, Drive-By Trucker is here with a solo effort. And last of all, as a tribute to the band's announcement that they've played their last show (some would say, thankfully) I have the 25th anniversary edition of INXS - Kick.

Check it out.

  1. Cody ChesnuTT
  2. Mumford & Sons
  3. Paul Kelly
  4. Alice Cooper
  5. Wild Nothing

Song of the Week : Cody ChesnuTT - 'Til I Met Thee



If you haven't already heard it, check out the new Cody ChesnuTT album, Landing On A Hundred. It's packed full of some really funky soul. 

The only other ChesnuTT track I knew before this was Look Good In Leather, which is funky as hell, but not very serious and soulful. The tunes on this album seem to borrow from all over the Soul spectrum, grabbing Stevie Wonder style rhythms here and there, Sam Cooke crooning and on my SOTW, Marvin Gaye's horns.

The song is 'Til I Met Thee and I am sure you will hear the Marvin Gaye all over it. There's the horn section and the doo wop backing as well as the smooth bass and the layer on layer of instrumentation. I guess ChesnuTT picked it up too, because he seems to be trying to channel Marvin through his voice as well. 

Adios

Thanks for stopping by. May this weekend be the one you have that epiphany you've been waiting for; and may you get as much of a lie in as you need.

Hasala malakim.