Duesseldorf >Cologne

"I apologise" in D-Dorf

Last weekend we were in Duesseldorf to see my sister, her hubby and my 15 year old nephew who happened to be really sick all weekend, fever, throwing up, etc... unfortunately. Poor thing, and he's grown to almost double the size since I last saw him. Some photos to follow.

We timed our visit to coincide so we could see Gisele Vienne's "I apologise" at the Tanzhaus NRW. It's an experimental piece that apparently is categorised as a dance piece but really it's a very unusual creative collaboration between Gisele Vienne, Dennis Cooper and the three actors/dancers. There are about 20 wooden boxes on the otherwise bare stage that could be interpreted as caskets but really are boxes for lifesize dolls looking like underage schoolgirls. The main character / Jonathan, a young nerdy guy in a death metal t-shirt, opens the boxes, arranges, rearranges, hits the dolls, even tries to speak to them at one point. You see dolls peeking out from behind some of the boxes, looking almost alive. At one point Jean-Luc Verna appears and lies his head down in a puddle of stage blood that Jonathan has just poured onto the stage. He's tattoed all over (real tattos, no imagination here) and has a strong, eerie, utterly queer presence, he's fascinating to watch and his performance has a real ....gravity . Later a third character, Anja, appears, in a black wig, looking a bit like a doll, starting a vaguely robotic dance. Over this you hear an eerie atmospheric score by Peter Rehberg/Pita (I liked what I heard), with Dennis reciting poems and a passage from "The Sluts" (I think) in between, there is at least one passage where there are several voices and you can't hear them so clearly but something weird/horrible seems to be happening. The piece reaches a certain climactic density towards the end, but there's no closure, it's utterly disorientating, maybe recounting a murder or something horrible, acting out an obsession, making a comment? Who are the dolls and are they more real than the performers? Are they projections or are they projecting themselves? What is happening? It seems to be opening up a secret inner room (not unlike Lynch) where reality and fantasy/obsession blur. Throughout there's a very convincing doomy, earthy, almost pagan atmosphere that somehow reminds me of Dennis' novels.

I haven't seen the apparently useless adaption of "Frisk" and I think it's been said it's difficult to adapt Dennis' novels. A long time ago someone told me he felt like entering a forbidden room when reading "Frisk" for the first time, like being dragged into a previously unknown space. It's exhilarating and disorientating, there is just so much going on, what is real and what is imagined, what is haunting and who is dreaming what, it is not always so clear, and it's also not clear how the reader/ spectator is implicated. So I thought that "I apologise" really worked, not as a straightforward adaption, obviously, but it managed to open up a similarly haunted space of private obsession, memory and violence.

The Tanzhaus is a great place, tucked away near the bad part of town, it's one of those post industrial art complexes you find all over Germany, it's really big, features a huge cafe, a big informal lobby/bar, a dance school at the back (?), and there are some more theatres (??) right next to it. The main room looked a bit like a big school gym room which somehow corresponded with the schoolgirl look of the dolls. At one point the scene looks almost like a highschool shooting too, with the dolls lying all over the floor. There was a very interesting introduction and an even more interesting post-performance discussion with Giselle Vienne (who speaks German), both held in the more informal lobby sitting around in a circle in armchairs. I thought it was interesting and telling that she comes from a philosophical background, she emphasized that she was interested in exploring the gaps between reality and fantasy in her work. The dolls in particular represent this blurring of reality and obsession, they are alive, dead, undead, objects, fantasies, totems, signifyers, etc. Giselle explained that she chose the schoolgirl look because of the powerful "Lolita" image. According to her, the texts by Dennis are very much part of the score, and the only bits of text used, but she sees them more like as if you're in a powerful situation and you hear a song, maybe a Bowie song, but a song that really means something to you, there is no direct connection, just a combination of associations spinning around each other, making the picture more dense.

We thought the introduction would be in the main theatre space so we walked straight in only to see most of the dolls sitting in the front row, in the process of being put into the boxes byt the small crew. So weird! Why were they there? Was it maybe part of a pre show ritual to have them seated in the audience before the performance? I've seen photos from these pieces for quite some time on Dennis' blog so I already managed to establish some bizarre mental connection to them and to see them like that for the first time was...really weird. I loved it, the whole evening was really great! It gave me a strange buzz (with some low, undecipherable frequencies) for the whole weekend...

What's the time?: Safe Sci-Fi Nostalgia, fake security overload

the hairstyle was so strange. family ties, nostalgia rules. machinery leads back to older lifestyles. retro rocket set in stone. colours mark ascent into space-age jolliness. watching scifi reminds you of the possibilities, standards of living, stepped up and marked with the past. shiny and new in 1966. invention rings a bell. foreign houses. always the same place in denial. the crazy collapse of the modern world. tension rises in the corridors. programmed menace questions distortion. the same things questioned by convenience. the smile of the future. birds cracked. colours burst to promote a yes sign. environmental damage covers lonely flight. black trace, half orange, half truth. electricity lie. environmental message projected backwards. hypnotic rambling. loaded cyphers dominate civilization critique acting up. fractioned planet interface. melancholia overdrive. with ghost language. a siren collapses. space age glows into a desert stick. nostalgia fights another corner.

interlude: contemporary music. feel the now in the past. this animal will swallow your past. scratchy voice links the ages. a cry from the future rhymes with a lighthearted pun in the presence. flickering colours represent the next wave that you can't see right now. microphone's a blister right into applause. rotating skies. silhouette of a potential future. home in the background. wires promoting an absence. young face sings old music. woozy street scene. rhythmic interaction wins the day. a southern accent in Chicago, so you understand. filth keeps you going. rain relaxes your instructed positive motivation in sound. lie to the advertisers. sudden rush into meaningless. hiking into your own backyard. freebies snuggle up and overwhelm you. smothered in noisy hug.

hostility wave constructs an alternative screen. competetition drives you away. japanese whispers summon a full blown overwhelming street scene bathed in positivity, light, grace. twinkling little neon lights, you follow the corridor. there's a number hidden in the pompous display. written into the white space. landscaped misery overruled by internal chaos. nightmarish exercise. mother in a darkened interior. halftones with a religious background noise. the noise fog wrecks you as you dim the light. a shot in the arm will heal the time degradation matrix, regulate the breathing so it's streaming to the future. sitting on the toxic other side of everyday life. pleasure disappears into a grey hole. snapshots from the other side. horny sentences swallow lust. a soft touch deletes your account, swallows the time machine and spits you out in a starlit night. caught like a rabbit in the headlights. security overload makes you nervous. textures overload. paranoid interior panorama. therapies write a sunday on your senses. walking through the garden. release control factories. fear diseases. emptying images into a giant trash can. filtering out harsh surfaces. blurry edge upsets an outside wish generator. empty vessels steer into the opposite direction. what are we now? overhead lighting dominates the head. words disappear into black.

Gallon Drunk @ the 100 Club

The 100 Club, right on (practically no go area) Oxford Street, hasn't changed its decor since about the 50s I reckon. In the punk days when the club hosted some very famous era-defining gigs, it already must have looked retro. Louche, red, pictures of old jazzers in frames, etc. The sign by the stage forbidding any photographs looks really old, and everyone seems to ignore it, haha. It's a fun club though, a bit rough around the edges but quite comfortable and, yeah, definitely haunted. I saw Siouxsie return to the stage where she played her first public show year before last, and it was quite impressive. She managed to keep it fresh and fierce, so it wasn't just a nostalgia fest. The mighty Gallon Drunk worked well in there too, the retro setting fitting their distinctive brand of swampy, utterly possessed rock'n'roll. It's retro, yeah, but in a totally undead way. Here and now and in your face but also lost in some vague past where signifyers get meshed up. There's post punk edginess, there's old fashioned swooning, and there's some odd, over the top noises. Pretty intense, long may it roll...

Open Urban Spaces: Süd Isar in Munich

Some photos (click to enlarge) from my walk along the southern parts of the Isar that flows through Munich. All along the Isar there are green open spaces, it's a giant lung, not that wide but you can walk along it through the entire city. Just north of the centre is the more famous English Garden, which I know fairly well. That's were I always go when I'm in Munich. Some lovely big meadows, the Monopteros, the Chinese Tower. That's all very much part of the known topography when I'm there. But I've always known about the open, green and less manicured spaces along the Isar in the southern parts and as you leave the city, I've just never been there before. A friend of mine, a photographer, was commissioned, sometimes in the mid -80s , to capture the impromptu life along the riverbanks as part of an exhibition exploring the way these urban spaces evolved naturally and without too much planning along the Isar. One of his specialities was/is capturing scenes that aren't posed, street scenes, people coming together etc. It's not so easy to capture life at close up without it being too obvious, without someone becoming aware and there are some really interesting photos of people using these spaces, partying, fishing, cycling, boating, you do get the sense that the urban life along the the river banks has evolved over a long period of time and is happening because the topography supports it. I've had the book with his photographs for years but always wondered about where exactly I would have to go to get to there. So on my recent trip to Munich I was sitting in the front passenger seat next to Antje, my sister in law (my niece and my brother were in the back) on the way to Schloss Nymphenburg (another location I'm not so familiar with) , discussing the latest Nelly Furtado album (no comment) for some reason, when we crossed a bridge and suddenly there I saw these open meadows, and immediately recognized that that's where it was. So the next day I took the S-Bahn to a stop near the zoo. The Isar there has about three different strands with narrow pieces of land running along or between them, there are several bridges, walkways, etc. I first walked further south where it quickly became more quiet and almost rural, it really didn't feel like being in a city anymore, though you did get joggers, people walking their dogs, or just hanging out. As I turned around and walked back and further into Munich, the scene got denser, there were more people, factories, old railway bridges, graffiti, lush little peninsulas, open meadows, old buildings looming out in the distance, walls, paths ending in dead ends. It also got more confusing, you kinda neede to know which bridge to cross to get further. It's not that wide, maybe a mile or less, but you can follow it all through Munich, and there are spaces along it that are more or less unplanned and quite interesting all along it. It's like another line of space cutting through the more regular urban space, an alternative route, where there's more nature, water, and the occasional urban marker that will make you realize you're still in a city. When you walk along the Regent's Canal in London, say, from King's Cross to Primrose Hill, or from Islington to Victoria Park you get a similar sense of walking along a slightly detached urban route that is defined by the water, it's quieter, sometimes a bit eerie, quite industrial in places, but it definitely has a different pace, a different atmosphere. The Regent's Canal hasn't got that many green spaces, it has some, and it follows a weird, almost invisible route, if you don't know the area it pops out unexpectedly, wheras the Isar in Munich runs a straight line that clearly divides the city. So the parallels end somewhere... but it's interesting to see how cities have these seemingly leftover spaces that become an escape from the regular more fast paced urban life but are also very much part of the urban experience.

Concerto for Voice and Machinery Re-Enactment at the ICA: A Blast (and a Drill) from the Past

I'm listening to the new Shins album, haha, it's very pretty and gorgeous though at times perhaps a little vacuous, "wincing the night away" and reminding me that it can still take good, hummable melodies, old fashioned emotions and a very pretty voice to change someone's life. Or was that just a line in a movie? Really, I love the Shins, okay?

I chose it as a contrast to this evening's "entertainment" which was a re-enactment of the legendary "Concerto for Voice and Machinery" by members of Einstuerzende Neubauten, Genesis P. Orridge, Fad Gadget, etc. in the first week of the equally legendary year of 1984. It was a commissioned piece that ended in a riot and is apparently now part of the mythology of the ICA as a radical arts space (right next to the establishment, Buckingham Palace, etc). Pure noise terror. Drilling into the floor. And it still was that, but thankfully for not too long (the original piece was 25 minutes) and this time earplugs were provided when you walked in. Even though I'm not sure whether I can see the point of it...

The first thing I notice is that the ICA is now non smoking, yay! Finally the bar and theatre space has relatively clean air. there are a lot of cool gigs there but this theatre (!) space is ill equipped for a sold out room of smokers, no air conditioning! Thanks, ICA, for doing this earlier rather than later...

there are a lot of faces gathered that seem vaguely familiar or famous. Faces out of a time machine maybe. it's attracted a good crowd for sure. if you miss the 80s here it is for you to see and hear again, even if that doesn't work completely.

After about five minutes the noise is already too much for me and i use the fact that my glass is empty as an excuse to venture leisurely outside to get another beer where the racket inside sounds kinda interesting, to the bar men at least.

There are several pieces that make up the Concerto, the actors (?) playing the various characters as faithfully as possible switch, uh, instruments. Terrible noise passages, painful even with earplugs, with some slightly more managable bits in between. There are people re-enacting the audience heckling. Towards the end you see a thin figure in black leather, someone reenacting Blixa Bargeld. When he was at the ICA recently for the concert film "Palast der Republik" he didn't seem to like being asked about this event. Maybe he doesn't like to dwell on the past. I'm not sure whether it really worked for me either, but there was something liberating about the physicality of the textured noise unleashed on the audience in exactly the same way that made it more than mere nostalgia. It felt ... good, afterwards, like you managed to get rid of something that bothered you.

The people on stage weren't those legendary performers, and even though they did a good job at acting like them, there was something missing, a real presence rather than just noise. But I guess that's not the point. Or is it? It didn't really sound that great to be honest. I wonder whether Madame Tussaud's will devote a room to them next...

My niece...

...and the giant phone outside a shop near my bro's house in Munich. "Can you hear me now?"

CAFE LLOYD 1983 -2007 (???)

I don't know what's happening with the old Cafe Lloyd in my hometown of Ulm but a friend told me it was sold. Will it still be the "Lloyd" after they rebuild it? I don't know. All I know is I spent a significant part of my younger years in here. When it opened in 1983 it was one of the first punk/new wave cafe/places in town, it was a tiny space, and it was very cosy and dark, the windows were covered, it was this weird little secret place, a new thing. I only went there a few times in the very early days. It soon got its first extension, a kind of garden-house-like space with big potted yucca plants, pink neon tubes in the window, mirrors, again with a neon tube display in various bright colours, and big windows that were now open to the outside. Next to that was a tiny garden where about half of a pink original Lloyd car lay stranded. Later there was another extension there too, but even with these two extensions it was still small. It soon became an institution, it was vaguely trendy, vaguely not, a bit grotty, a bit over the top sometimes, but nevertheless it retained a certain oddball vibe that was rooted in the 80s when it had its heyday. Throughout the 80s and 90s a circle of close friends would meet there regularly. We would sit in the cafe for hours talking and drinking, play the pinball machine, hang out. It was somewhere where it was ok to be. You would always meet people there. The music in there was always fairly well chosen. You would hear new records in there, at least in the old days. Sometimes it was funky, edgy, claustrophobic and almost clubby in there, other times just chilled. The milky cafe was good. It was always a bit too small but that was part of its appeal too. For a long time one or two or three meetings at Christmas there was a given. Where else? I walked though this door hundreds of times. The neon tubes in the window stayed throughout, looking dated in a cool way in the end. The 80s chic came and went, came back etc. The Lloyd became just another cafe in the end, I guess. I don't know what happened.

Spoon- Subspace biographies (Live)

i am quail and quasar
i pick you up on radar
i do my job each day
empties crushed and fired away

scabland

oh. the lines inside the face were running deeper. to a river, running deeper.

oh. the downwards facing settlements, memories of fear, noone takes a brighter spark. erupts. and helps you walk into the garden. just as everything went black.

oh. and noones left inside the garden. noones dancing caring living, but the memories run deep.

oh. when the site is cleared it's all you see it's all you feel and all is healed.

oh. take a turn and scatter movements so the shadows know you inside out and follow you and take good care of you.

oh. was the world too dirty for a drunken sailor. dirty vast scablands cover the green meadows where you stood.

burn the cake and eat it
a faster round
did it spin to fire
were you hurt

scabland feel me
i'm alive
burning pictures
scatter down
is the face a dim light
or on fire
did it clean the next round
feed you light

oh. do you come into a desert town and stare and noone feels you coming closer and it's ending and it's fine but did you notice it still spins though all you did was say the word and all you said was be on fire....

antlers

bow into swirling ground
never stand up
like antlers from a frozen head

silent in the ground
gorgeous foggy street signs
point into another direction

as the soundman approaches and takes it away
bow down and spit into a smiling mouth
and pierce the face
like antlers facing outward
struggle
and inward calm
like stones standing in a circle
to protect
the light that fades away

for nothing prepares you for the sight
of silent antlers facing westward
while you sleep
and waste the dream

antique doll

brush stroke
the wind
it blast a little fortune into you
make it go and tear the mask away
little antique doll
your face betrays a wisdom
i don't see
in twisted fairground whispers
as you see
this ending is too close

little butterfly
is this still your wish
has it come true
or is it denied
knives out and a different scene
unfolds into a lenghty silent background
on your head
on your head

and i'm looking for a closing line
days and days to shine on through
fierce fighting
stolen glances
and a golden wish to guide me

and i'm looking for an eye to share
is this what makes it all so red
so green
so melted
so real
so turned on
so forgiven
so automatic
so strange
so magic

that i can't swim away
from your face
and freeze when you smile

and i'm looking for a doll to see
to show me the way
into this other room

and i'm looking for a closing line
to wrap the shades around
and falter

Disclaimer: We're recording some of these, sung more like a smudge than real words, probably, tomorrow. I'm trying to get some words to sing written down, it's not easy / too easy. i don't know. The songs are strong though... imagine these words heavily distorted, low in the mix, theatrical. might work!

when i'm pretty

when i'm sad,
when the stars reach out
and feel i'm bad,
when a light touch sinks
my troubles rise.
funny lanterns
ride on high
a wave that you regret
and realize
is that all you see
in your green night
when it's over
when it's bad
will you still steer clear
or push me behind
is the last word here
or in the ground
is this all you see
and all you found
when i'm happy
when i'm torn
when the night wind says
that i am born
when i'm trying to be
so late again
will the clockwork sink me
or take me to bed?

when i see it right in front of me


all the right gasps go
"pretty no!"
is there all one meaning
a flowerhead
for the greatest reason
to stay out of bed
will the last one turn
and stay ahead

when i'm pretty
when i'm bad
whne i'm sunken
when i'm spared
when i'm tortured
when i'm stared @
when the last word circles

WHEN IT'S LATE

is there all one world
or noone there
in the end?
will i find a finish
torn away
and my private island
...

flower

watch out tiny one
believe the rage is yours
to steam and rise
through dusty tunnels
run away with dripping time
crawl up the balcony
bang on the door
hold on to fading skin
thrown on the floor
make it a contact piece
a comment a picture
a summery item
ride for colour
and slide a little flower
through your head dress
a blue staircase
and unfolding lights
stare ahead
give it to slaughter
feel it stride
do you want to control it
is it not your own wish
will it bloom forever
will it grow into an empty space
when will you realize
the trail is broken
where you abandoned the scent
make my machine forever yours
spray pollen
lick the seeds in the dust
find a reason
to make it flower again
2

fog on the road, playing out til sunrise: 1991

messy hair unproductive<>fault at heart<>laughing teenagers<>win a blue line running to the moon<>it's ok to id the sunset<>the younger john peel<>relax with a fan<>stomping feet to forget the rising time<>a whitewash?<>it was always a flat field<>a flag for perversion<>a younger smile<>i was so young in the hazy street<>we are all more equal now<>i distort voices with my memory lines<>speed interviews<>lying on a fake temporary plastic couch<>checking sunglasses<>creeping a hat over your festival experience<>vomit<>planes<>cities<>a face floating in a blur<>shades<>agreeable mouth<>a suit in an airport<>a young pupil doing better than the statistic<>following a suitcase with a butcher's head printed in a funny pattern<>moshpits escalate into swirling noise<>intuitive drunken bus ride<>dark lipped tiles<>i was a bright spark in a sunny afternoon<>release tension<>brighter shades in the background<>blend in<>young gods reflect on stonehenge<>leafy country lanes<>naughty boy smile<>repetition<>it's a release<>pissing with sharpness<>a finger takes the taste into your mouth<> circles of light<>riding a pop wave noone wants<>inside the time machine<>everything leads to a plastic crash<>i lived in a hole at the time<>now everything sounds bigger and heavier<>foggier<>orange lights drive into the movement<>houses appear with a rhythm<>all this was as you see<>but you can't touch it anymore<>the connections are getting blurry<>i was so happy to see you in the swirling lights....

Alien Sex Fiend's 25th anniversary show

It's 1984. We're in a car driving to my parents house. In the car is my best friend Frank, a female friend of his who is driving and G. We've been staring each other out for a while at the local punk parties. I don't know whether G. is straight or gay but he told me I look good. I've got black hair for the first and only time in my life. We sneak into my room, it's late and my room is right next to my parents bedroom. We have to be quiet. G. sits himself down on the floor in the corner just beyond the door and takes a cassette out of his black leather jacket. He says he likes it cos it's so "kaputt", so totally screwed up. It's Alien Sex Fiend's "Acid Bath", we play a few tracks and my mom pops in. She tells us to keep it down but she impressed G. by being reasonably friendly. I just want to do whatever he wants to do. I'm so fascinated. Later in the car he starts making vaguely insulting comments about Franks female friend in a sort of jokey way, noone's sure whether he actually means it. We are playing the tape again.

Another party, this time at Franks house. The punk scene in our small city is there but also the Goths, everyone knows each other vaguely. We play The Cure's "The Top" nonstop, singing along. A lot of people seem to have suddenly got really into the Cure at that point. Some of the punks get pissed off. Later we go to the local cemetery. We drive up there in cars, climb over the gates and wander around. People start nicking the candles, and I walk with G. holding a candle underneath his face. He looks really spooky like that. His parents are Italian and he has a handsome, Mediterranean face, like an Italian new wave James Dean. His black hair is short at the back but long in front and always slicked up into a kind of horn sticking out in front of his face. We walk and bond like that and i will always remember his face, looking like a ghost. Holding a candle underneath someone's face in the dark creates an eerie effect, I found out that night. When we came back to Franks house, one of the punks had broken "The Top" in two and had left the pieces of broken vinyl in front of the house, a dramatic gesture, haha. I still think about these times a lot.

Last Saturday Alien Sex Fiend played their 25th anniversay show in London. I'd never seen them so I went with my friend Steve. It wasn't very good but there was a sense of occasion about the event. The audience looked fabulous. The original Batcave look is still very much a force, this slightly cartoon-ish, campy vibe, there were quite a few gay people in the audience too. The DJs played the Virgin Prunes' "Baby Turns Blue" and a lot of people danced and sang along. I think that was my favourite moment of the evening. The stage was draped in spiders webs, there were inflatable bones everywhere that later would get thrown into the crowd, and some trash cans. Nik Fiend still looks like the undead back in 1984, his distinctive zombie face painted white, prancing about wearing a huge hat with cards tacked into the brim. But he was drunk, didn't care and it was pretty shambolic. The beats courtesy of Ms Fiend were alright and kept it together, just about. I read a Poppy Z. Brite novel in which two vampires are playing a gig in a club except it was more their presence that entertained, rather than musical merits. It kinda was like that. Still "kaputt", but vaguely fascinating. Shame about their rendition of "E.S.T. (Trip to the moon)", the one song I really remember from the 1984 days. It lacked something, but hey, I saw it. Above is some really fun footage from the original Batcave. I remember in those days we used to dream about London, and I once said to Frank, sitting on his windowledge as we used to, discussing his next hairstyle, I said: "Hey, we are in London" and in a way I still can't argue with that.

"Better Days Will Haunt You": Chavez

Some screenshots from the goofy little tour film "Boys Making Music - Music Making Men" following the NYC band Chavez and the mighty Guided by Voices on their first (and in Chavez' case only) European tour in 1995. It's edited for the oddball moments, so that it's fun to watch and won't get boring for the casual viewer, though i suspect there's lots more vintage footage, especially of GBV in their first prime, and I could definitely watch this for hours. I saw that tour when it came to Brighton, The Amps (Kim Deals short lived low key Dayton band that featured future GBV players Nate Farley and Jim Mc Pherson) were supporting GBV and i guess were the main draw of the evening. And one thing i didn't realize was that that was the evening I saw Chavez too. I'm always going on about that evening i saw Guided By Voices without really knowing them and in their more or less original lineup. I need a Time Machine. 90s nostalgia, it's happening... So I remember i saw Chavez too at the Concorde at some point around that time but i didn't realize it was the very same night, they opened it up, it's the last piece of the puzzle so to speak. I remember liking them, thinking that there probably was some sort of low key little cult around them in New York. I couldn't put my finger on it, but they were good. Well, they released two albums on Matador and then more or less vanished but they were being talked about in their absence and briefly reformed to support GBV on their final tour in NYC (we missed most of their set as we got talking to good Blowfish people in the lobby, i need another time machine to revisit these glorious gigs). So Matador has always been amazing with their box sets and reissues, documenting the past in their own low key, resolutely indie and definitely generous ways. The GBV box set, 'Hardcore UFOs', is seriously great, i can't think of another label who could have done such a good job. then there's Pavement, the 2 disc DVD set, which I've watched so many times, the 'Slanted and Enchanted' and 'Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain' reissues. So much material, and so nicely packaged too. Nerdy, but so what. It's a labour of love. All of these at a reasonable prize too. So now there's the Chavez Box set (!) with the two albums and a third DVD disc. I already pointed out the GBV connections, especially on the tour film, but i like the music too, it's crunchy, rocking, pretty fierce but with sweet hooks in there, definitely a grower too. In the liner notes Cosloy and Lombardi say these albums were Matadors top seller of the 90s and the best they ever put out. Maybe hyperbole? I can think of a few other albums. Anyway, it's a nice box set and it's recommended.

Some of the screenshots are from Berlin where they played at The Insel, in former East Berlin right by the river, on the little meadow in front of the venue. Behind the stage is a wall that has "Guided By Voices", "Chavez" and "Tocotronic" graffitied all over it. The Tocos were playing on the German leg of this tour (Time Machine, please :-) A German GBV fan I know was at that show. He didn't know GBV at that point either but remembered he really liked the music, it reminded him of the Beatles, however soon after GBV had started their set, a friend lead him away to, uh, smoke something, that took a while (ho hum) and when he came back they'd finished and he had missed most of the set.

The tour manager, Kris Lee, on this tour who is in some shots getting smoke blown into his face by the very stoned men of Chavez was also the tour manger on GBVs 2002 tour, i remember him driving the rock van on that fantastic tour.

In the end you see Everett True on stage at the Kings College gig in London, singing along to "Lethargy". He was at that Brighton show too, gently wigging out right next to me. A lot of people had left by the time GBV came on. Some people danced. They didn't play that long. I stayed til the end. Well, to say any more I'd need to go back. A couple of songs recorded at the show were released as "Brighton Rocks" on a promo single. The old Concorde has long been demolished and is now in a new location further down the seafront. Brighton rocks. Chavez rocks too. Better Days will haunt you, indeed.

2006 - Best ofs

Well, it's fun, isn't it. Though this year I purchased even less new albums than last year. One big thing this year was delving deeper into music from Germany, both past and present, mainly Tocotronic, but also reading the great "Verschwende Deine Jugend" docu-novel about the early punk/new wave days in Germany and listening again to Fehlfarben and co.

Anyway here's a few I liked this year:

Sonic Youth: "Rather Ripped" - I don't always get their new records but I love SY. I think this was the last one I got since, uh, which one? Can't remember even...agggh "A Thousand Leaves". That's quite a long while ago. I'll go see them live anytime though. It was on my birthday wishlist, and it was bought for me, and it was a while before I gave it a few closer listens. It's poppy in places and quite typical sounding but after a while the trademark noise rock textures and the slightly faded washed up vibe they do so well becomes, ermm, clearer. I love "Rats", and quite a few others. They hold up well. I really like this album.

Tool: "10.000 Days" I tried not to like them or find them embarrasing. I just can't. Their live show is incredible, it's so switched into the way i subconsciously feel about a lot of things it's uncanny. Tunnels. Double worlds. Cyberpunk. Paranoia. Disintegrating images. Strangely constructed music. Guitarists who play music as if it's some weird science. And a great, slightly detached frontman, posing in front of the giant screens with their trippy slowly morphing images. Where do they come from? How do they do this? It's so assured. Anyway, I think this album is strong and enjoyable, I played it a lot this year. It's quite good at work too, a bit of background trance :-)

Isis: "In The Absence of Truth". More ambient heaviosity. I love the way they build up a tension, eventually switching into full on screamo metal mode, then retreat back into dark abstract Mogwai-style territories. Great live! I love the DVD "Clearing The Eye" too, was that released this year? it features a full live show...

The Melvins: "A Senile Animal". Yesterday I walked through boggy fields in the Chilterns on my New Years Day walk with the highly recommended old Melvins album "Bullhead" on the headphones. I love that sludgy, doomy, kinda underdeveloped sound. It could almost be "Faith" by the Cure in its stark minimalist stance but it's more formless and weirder. And this new record still has that essential sound, now with two drummers and backing vocals.

TV on the Radio: "Return to Cookie Mountain" I'm still digesting this but it's tremendous. Isn't it amazing that, 24 years after "Treasure" and 17 years after "Doolittle", 4AD can still release albums that gracefully piss over anything that calls itself "indie"? But don't let that put you off :-)

And two more from these awesome art rock veterans, so glad they're still around/around again:

Mission of Burma: "The Obliterati"

The Flaming Lips: "At War with the Mystics". Don't know why but this is my favourite Flaming Lips release by now. Really worked for me.

Robert Pollard: "Normal Happiness" For some reason, "From a Compound Eye" was last years record in my head, even though it was released this year too. Okay both of them, amazing, still! NH is shorter, but there's no shortage of wonderful little pop moments that will hook themselves into your head. I fear this record is not getting the response it deserves, it seems to sell more like a Fading captain-style side project, maybe two major albums a year IS too much (not for me though). He's giving up touring apparently too. It's a shame the solo career seems even less lucrative than GBV. And that he's seemingly given up on his overseas fans. But he still knows what he wants and he's still doing it. And the songs are still there. And for that I am grateful. Looking forward to the Circus Devils 2-disc set and the Best of Fading Captain next year.

Oh, and "The May Releases" on Bob's long running side projects label Fading Captain(the 50th release comes this year and will close the series!): The Keene Brothers, Psycho and The Birds, and The Takeovers. I like them all, it took me a while, but I think now I appreciate Psycho and the Birds and The Takeovers too for their assured smudginess, they're like strange low-key sketches, but it mainly works. The Fading Captain series really has come into its own, there's a lot of charm and confidence in what he puts out there, maybe too much for some, but I'm still interested. Keene Brothers, Bobs collaboration with current touring partner Tommy Keene, is great old school power pop and lovely mid tempo wistfulness and was an immediate hit in my house, right from the under-a-minute opener "Evil Vs. Evil".

Okay, my most important music purchase this year however probably was "The Best of Tocotronic", released 2005 I think. German Indie Gods not very well known outside German speaking countries. I knew them before, but not that well, and listening to this made me slowly but surely fall in luv. I've got pretty much everything by them now. It really started the ball rolling and I spent some time listening to German music again this year and reconnected with stuff I had halfway forgotten. That felt good and it will continue.

Greatest Gigs in 2006:

The Cure: Royal Albert Hall. I've seen them quite a few times since, uh, 1984 but this may be the Cure show I always wanted to see. Absolutely mindblowing.

Teenage Fanclub, The Bevis Frond: The Forum

Pere Ubu: The Mean Fiddler

The Silver Jews: Green Man Festival, Wales. I was in a shitty mood, it rained, we stood in the extra muddy bit and it couldn't have been more morose. Pavement's Steve West filled in on drums. Strangely perfect.

The Books: Queen Elizabeth Hall. A long time ago I walked through Marseilles and had this idea to record street noises and make music over it later. I thought that was a really original idea at the time. It's cool to see that people are making such great music with found images and sounds, though it's quite a slick, highly edited show.

The Wedding Present: The Forum (signs from the WP asking people not too smoke. Yay!)

Yo La Tengo: Bush Hall. (Smoke Free, double yay!)

Depeche Mode, Gang of Four: Hyde Park. A day after my birthday.

Deerhoof: The Scala. Just before their (second?) guitarist quit and reaching the same dizzy heights as about a year before at the ICA. When they're on, they're ON!

Of Arrowe Hill & The Lilys: The Luminaire. Great double bill, ATP warmup.

Patti Smith & Kevin Shields: Queen Elizabeth Hall. "The Coral Sea". Patti Smith was reciting a long poem about her old friend Robert Mapplethorpe, while Kevin Shields (My Bloody Valentine) was sitting on a sofa on stage playing these long, abstract guitar noise motives, gradually reaching a dazzling intensity. Was recorded and will be released eventually.

That's probably enough for now. Happy new year!