Friday, January 27, 2006  1:45 pm 

Bad Blood/The Old Gods Number 1

Matthew E - Bad Blood!

Just searching the internet to find some more stuff out about lovely people over at Skint Records artist Matthew E (erm,one half of Radioslave it turns out- he famous) when I found this comment on a dance music record site about my favourite track off the 12” check it

‘Bad Blood is analogue mindfuckery and isn’t really usable outside of torture rooms’

lol. I think this is meant to say they don’t like it, but sound perfect to me, with the addition of ‘torture rooms and xxjfg’.

So not only does Matthew turn out a very nice set of italo now and again but in this guise he’s knocking with a bloody great big glam rock drum on the door of the sadly missed Fat Truckers, Earl Brutus and Add n to x and asking them all to come out and play. (more googling sees that Ben Trucker actually did come out and play with the other one from radioslave, ahhh isn’t that nice?) Being a local I wonder if Matthew would do a live set of stuff like this at thedoclub?

Old Gods # 1

The success amongst our readers of our comrade Mat aka Lord Nuneaton Savage’s posts last year demanded continuation, so after some bargaining with him, in which a priceless jade lion, a vial full of virgin blood and a Unicorn horn changed hands we managed to convince him to make this thing more or less regular, so from now on Mat will have a column dedicated to reissues that, as a tribute to the master HPL he has decided to name ‘The Old Gods’. So welcome back again Mat, and thank you. You, readers, simply enjoy because this is fucking class.

Eno Moebius and Roedelius: After the Heat (1978)

‘After the Heat’ exists in its own land, away from such ‘Man-machine’ albums as ‘Computer World’ and ‘Iron Fist’. It inhabits the landscape of the Ghost-machine; a place pretty much unexplored by following generations of interface abusers.

Even the tracks that feature vocals sound desolate (thanks in no small part to Eno’s inflection-less voice). Check ‘The Belldog’. Eno sings of ‘Becoming part of the machnery’ and yet this is not rock’n'roll sturm und drang- that of the all-fucking, self-annihilating metal beast- nor Kraftwerk’s visions of silent, androgynous pace, but rather a lonely song of hermitude. His final acceptance of machine destiny a resignation, an inevitability.

Even the ominous ‘Broken Head’ has an accidental menace. Words conjugated, bereft of reason, suggesting nothing but themselves. The music emerging from desireless-ness as a robotic ‘Struwellpeter’.

The music is cut from the same continuity as Moebius & Roedelius’s work in Harmonia and Cluster, but at an extra remove. The players can be seen as spectres; whispering through analogue haunted castles full of their own peculiar dances and dreams. Their loping half-skanks almost an accident of function.

When traditional instrumentation appears, such as the piano on ‘Luftschloss’, it is played almost parodically straight, devoid of halts and time-drags. A naked clustering of cosmetically ‘pleasing’ notes resolving themselves into melody.
By the final track, ‘Old Land’, the listener becomes aware that they are not meant to be here. This utopia is post-human; a world of un-manned machines in vast, snowy landscapes. Blinking into nothingness.

Eno, Moebius and Roedelius- Belldog

After the Heat has been released in Water Records.

Weekend Agenda

Tonight it’s Yeborobo with Shimmy Rivers and Canal and Theromones at the Freebutt.

Check out how good Yeroboro are:

Yeroboro- SOS

More mp3 goodness at their site and myspazztronic

After go to the Sussex Arts Club for the ‘Mess Around’ rockabilly/garage rock/girl pop/blues excellent vintage stuff dance party.

Lord Nuneaton Savage’s kraut improv duo Raised By Wolves will be playing in the Freebutt on sunday the 29th, together with the thudtastic Sticks and Miasmos. Not to be missed.

xxxxx

And to finish, we’d like to welcome 12A.M. Maternal, a new mp3 blog brought to you by none other than the master of all things dark Mr. Midnight Mike. As you can imagine we are quite excited about this, and could go on at lengths about the sort of mindblowing vinyl trainspotterism we expect to enjoy there, but let the gentleman talk… ‘jack yourself into the matrix and start downloading some mp3 representations of the finest rare records, from my vaults, or that of the occasional discerning guest selector’.

It’s a yousendit thang purposefully, so hurry up and start getting the good shit because it’s gonna run out!

12 A.M. Maternal

Have a nice weekend!

labels >> xxjfg