Category: Music
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The Black Angels – The Warehouse, Houston
Despite having heard only a four-track EP by The Black Angels, I thought they’d probably be worth seeing live, so jumped at the chance when they came through Houston. This was again at the Warehouse, but in a different/smaller room than the one I saw The Black Keys in – either that or they have remodeled and significantly downsized. This time the ‘stage’ (a wooden platform that stood at most a foot off the ground) was squashed in a corner of the room, and there were sofas in the ‘audience area’, which I didn’t take as a good sign. The evening… Read more
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A Year With Last FM
In a post a year ago I described a recently-published chart of ‘best ever’ albums that claimed to be the most accurate as it was based on historical sales. I posited that a chart based on what people were actually listening to would be better, although this would be impossible to obtain. In that post, I hazarded a guess (by way of example) that the 10 albums I listened to the most were: Radiohead OK Computer Desaperacidos Read Music Speak Spanish Bob Dylan, Highway 61 Revisited Jesus and Mary Chain Darklands At The Drive In Relationship of Command Pleasure Forever Alter Oasis… Read more
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Radiohead Ate My PC
Unless you’ve just emerged from a coma (in which case you have probably have better things to do than read this ‘blog) you’ll no doubt be aware that Radiohead‘s latest album In Rainbows was released last Wednesday (10th October 2007). In typically contrary style, Radiohead have eschewed the traditional release approach, and have made the new album available as a (effectively) free download. This is not a new tactic – Dead Heart Bloom did the same thing with both of their first two albums. What made Radiohead unique is that they left the price up to the individual purchaser – “It’s… Read more
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This Lost Boy, Back From the Wilderness…
Many years ago (1988), I took my girlfriend-at-the-time to see Roy Harper play live. He was supported by a young singer/songwriter/guitarist called James Varda. The gig was excellent, and I was so impressed with James Varda, that I bought his debut LP, Hunger (direct from the record label , as HMV didn’t carry it). It didn’t disappoint, with the best lyrical imagery this side of thin-wild-mercury Dylan, and some powerful use of a semi-accoustic 12-string. I must have all but worn out the grooves on that album. A year or so later the girlfriend left me and – I found out later… Read more
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The Black Keys, The Warehouse, Houston
I’ve been back in Houston for four months now, and decided that it was about time I got back into the live music scene. There was no-one I desparately wanted to see, playing, but I fancied a night out, so I took my chances with The Black Keys, at the Warehouse. I hadn’t heard anything by The Black Keys, but I’d heard some positive things about them, so I thought I’d give it a go.  Finding out that Dinosaur Jr. were also on the bill was the decider – although I couldn’t believe that J. Mascis & co. were relegated… Read more