Music Moment: John Martyn, “Small Hours”

Unngn….

Just come home from a very long late shift. Back up at 6.30am tomorrow morning. Like a human perpetual machine i be….

so just a moment to put out this charming little nugget of ambient folk rock bliss from JOHN MARTYN. The story with this track (from his 1977 album, “One World”) was he recorded this in the very late hours outside his Cottage/recording studio by the edge of a small lake with the speakers positioned both on the shored and out in the water. It all adds to a track that just simply breathes. If you turn it up, you can even hear the wind rushing through the trees and the call of some waterfowl. It’s the perfect music to listen to on the looong summer nights that peole will defintiely be spending at Summer houses all across Iceland.

Goodnight…

 

Music Moment: Bongwater feat Ann Magnuson, “You Don’t Love Me Yet”

Throooooooooooooooooob….

Ok things are picking up speed and spiraling out of sweet, sweet control. Theatre review is DONE. Interview with Art gallery is sorted for TOMORROW (now i have to work out what sort of questions to ask her). Need to get my little music column piece up and running. Have a good idea, but it’s coming up with a slew of decent ideas so it can continue that’s the difficult bit.

Oh and i Actually bought an album for reviewing. Yes i bought and album to review with my own money. I’m not really sure why i did that. Could be that i love music n’ stuff. Oh well it was cheap, but  i haven’t listened to it all the way through yet. Initial thoughts; some good tracks, some really weird (in not that good weird), tracks that I’m sure was put on the album by mistake. It will come out in the wash, i can assure you of that.

So for tonight’s music I’m interested in something a little bit uplifting with a sliver of psych pop to it. What could i possibly use. I know how a cover made by BONGWATER featuring Anne Magnuson on vocals of the “You don’t Love Me Yet” which of course was written by Roky Erikson during his days with the 13th Floor Elevators. Sounds melodic and a little bit dreamy and emotional. It’s just pretty and colourful and stuff. My god, what’s wrong with me????

Goodnight…

 

Music Moment: Blue Hawaii “Katie/Blue Gowns”

AaaaaahAhhhhh…………………

I’ve done nothing this evening except do some 70′s music research (read: check on YouTube for obscure stuff, then look for the album on the internet), chat to my UK family, and look at a blank word document in order to write two last reviews before the end of the year. Oh fuck it, I’ll get it done on the weekend.

And after looking at all that retro stuff, i just fancied a little something poppy, with a hint of Lo Fi and chillwave about it this evening. And lying unused in my corner was this little video from BLUE HAWAII, a duo that hail from Montreal Canada. Interesting to note that they are also signed to Arbutus records, which is also home to an earlier music dump aficionado, GRIMES. Anyway if you like this breezy pop stuff that’s a little similar to JJ, then their EP can be downloaded for free from the label website here.

 

Music Moment – Kimono “Kente”

ok, this is not going to be a big post, as I’m busy writing away like a mothering Hunter S Thompson on catnip. And then i´m off to join the wife for drinks downtown. this means i can’t do a lot of musing on this blog tonight. don´t worry though i will try to get something sorted tomorrow when i manage to get a spare hour.

So i´m going to do a little bit rocking right now with my old nemesis KIMONO. Now like a lot of people in Iceland, i love their current album “Easy Music for Difficult People”. All moody indie rock inflected with 70 prog overtones (and perhaps a little bit of Fleetwood Mac). But the thing that i really love about their music is that it broods. Not many bands can do this easily nowadays without looking like a bunch of arses. And one thing Kimono aren´t is a bunch of bumfaces.

So i´m playing my personal favourite from the album “Kente”. A light start that builds until they go straight into a gallop at the end like a band of Mongol marauders. And i say that is something you want from a rock track…..

Seeyas….

 

Music Moment – Yellow Swans “Mass Mirage”

RIIIIIIIGHT!!!

Now that I’m plugged back into the matrix (it felt so weird poking my fingers into the holes at the back of my head where my connector sockets should be), i can now start to get back on the writing buzz. Have people to contact, interviews to organise, yadayadayada

But we can now commence with the playing of the nightly music moment. I found “Mass Mirage” by Yellow Swans a couple of weeks ago as part of a compilation titled “14 tracks of Drone Pop” that was produced by the Bookmat website. Lots of lovely stuff From the Likes of BJ Nilsen & Ben Frost, but this track tingled my ears in the way that only a cheap Brazilian transvestite prostitute knows how…

From the start, it takes a simple echoed guitar riff and repeatedly builds on it, making it bigger and bigger until it practically collapses from the weight of its own noise. guitar drone as supernova if you’d like. Reminds me of classic My Bloody Valentine and Bardo Pond. Best to listen in a darkened cave or 1000m underwater…..

goodnight…..

 

Music Moment: The Secret Machines “the Fire is Waiting”

Good evening there my den of Rabid monkeys…..

God i was bored this evening. The football didn´t interest me, the Internets was slow and sluggish like a woman on Rohypnol, and i was a bit tired as well.

I also have a copy of the Latest Haffi Haff album with me with a view to review it. I´m almost too scared to listen to it, but i´ll give it a go over the weekend.

so tonight i needed something to rouse the lingering stomach microbes in the deepest passages of my bowels. And i remembered this song…

Most Icelanders may remember the Secret Machines for their song “Alone, Jealous and Stoned”, which received a lot of airplay in 2007/08. Well they have been quietly plugging along and released their last album “Secret Machines” almost unnoticed in 2008. Oh and they also lost their founding member which was a bit careless of them…

I seriously recommend that you get the “secret Machines” album. It´s a thunderous Pink Floyd style prog rock romp that hits all the right spots. I´m playing “the fire is waiting”, which is the cacophonous closing song. It just has that big, Pink Floyd, Sci Fi style of apocalyptic space rock that makes me shudder. When i play this song, I always seem to picture a city being laid to waste by tsunamis and Giant Cthulhu type sea-gods with tentacled penises these size of buildings. Or something like that.

Well have a listen and see if you agree with me….

Night night….