I guess I’m not against the Brighton ‘scene’ per se, I think I’m also (simply,vocally) wretching at that what has sprung from its initiative.

Right. Herman Dune. Well if it’ll shut you two up…

As to ‘scenes’ and so on, I think it’s a double-edged sword. It’s great to see communities of people springing up and inspiring each other and generating at atmosphere of creativity and things like that. But it can also lead to something of an orthodoxy at times, which can be a little restrictive. I don’t know. I’d certainly prefer to see some sort of scene springing up than none, and there seem to be the beginnings of a healthy enough one in Edinburgh at the moment, but I am still concerned that straightforward indie pop and basically anything that isn’t in some way low-fi folk related seems to struggle to take off in this city.

Which sounds much, much more ungrateful than I mean it to.

but i have to agree with most of what u say DC. although i desist from slagging the Brighton scene as, in my sad little way, i do admire folk doing stuff for themselves, even when i think its pure shite/not my cup of rosie. but yep good to know im not alone in my suspicions, i will only go as far as to say i find some of it grounded in a particular type of overly-whimsical humour which makes me wretch.

and while im here….. Herman Fucking Dune! matthew.. sort it out…. Yeah they have been unstinting supporters of The Wave Pictures for ages when nobody in Britain was having any of it. They have a nose for the good stuff. For me, i have to say i thought Giant was a step backwards cos they could lose the horns and percussion and interesting rhythms and i wouldnt lose sleep. maybe EMI wanted a return on the album. bastards. they were awesome just as a little slightly-arthouse indie rock band who indulged their jonathan richman fixation and love of classic shit and came up with something very very simple and very lovable.

sadly one of the brothers Andre has departed the band from what i heard and now performs as Stanley Brinks but yeah they are still awesome, if a little bit twee-er since he slung his guitar hook.

see what i did there.

yrs,
easily amused

p.s. where’s the frickin bartman?

p.p.s i know the Wave Pictures are a bit better known now but a while ago i got a homemade cdr off one of them called the Hawaii Open Mic Night. have u got it? I have a copy u can get or plz try and track it down and post some stuff off it on toad.

As for Herman Dune, try their most recent, Giant, as a starting point. These are also described as (French) antifolk, & I’m not even sure I’m happy with that title either. There is definitely a heavy hand of DIY going on but (in my humble) they are far too cuddly/safe for such a tag.

Maybe it’s just the way it is &, like all tags & labels, I have to accept that I’m growing old & what I once knew as one thing may not ever be that one thing ever again (RIP R’n'B, etc.) because the kids (just like us, once upon a long ago) automatically want to subvert what the fogies hold as inviolable.

*I know artistes do this in the norm, but I am referring to the type of person who wants you to, no demands that you believe the cracked/costume&make-up heavy stage presence is really real (I don’t want to mention The Bobby McGees, but they keep rising to the surface when I’m thinking about this), even though it is clearly obvious it’s a gimmick gone badly wrong & should have been binned a few hours after their credibility took a hike. Meow, indeed.

I would have to disagree with the slagging of the UK anti-folk movement though, but only in a very, very tentative way. I have hardly heard any of it, but what I have heard hasn’t been that bad, so I will stay judgment until I have a bit more idea what I’m talking about.

OK, I guess this bandying together of like minds & putting on ‘festivals’ under the ‘anti’-folk/twee-core ticket is clearly good for the collective exposure, but it waters down the actual impact of the original message(?) of the ‘movement’/reactionary standpoint. Sure, it’s still ‘community’ orientated but at what cost to the attention deficit music fickle public?

re: origins of antifolk proper, check out Paleface – he was Beck’s roomie (way before Beck had put arch acoustic snarl to vinyl) & some say a major influence on Beck’s initial stylings & output. Paleface‘s history is a sorry one, to be sure, after many failed leaps forward in his career (albums erased by accident in the mastering process – see Kramer & Shimmy Disc; ill-advised tours with the lieks of Crash Test Dummies, dropped by the majors after one album, blah blah blah), but will always be up there for the classic ‘Burn & Rob’ track – pure genius & most definitely an antifolk original.

Finally, Herman Dune. Absolutely. Some unfairly write them off as trite, mercilessly bouncy children’s songbook artists, but I love them. If you haven’t yet, get into them Toad. Do a posting. Fall in love.

the only thing i would say in its defence is that the community who operated under the umbrella of ‘antifolk’, in NYC (esp under the creative fug that is Olive Juice Music and the open mic at Sidewalk Cafe) were definitely a real community at ome point and, for me, that’s the most valuable thing i took from it. well, that and the chords and song structures of course. no, really, the idea that there is something valuable in that, in a supportive creative community saying DIY is A OK and making the music regardless rather than the usual slew of bands climbing on each other’s heads to get ‘somewhere’. (i.e. shafted by a major label and spewed back onto the pile)

i kinda wish there was a more easy way to galvanise what is already happening along similar lines here in Edinburgh itself. maybe a message board would help or a v good open mic type thing. i dunno. i guess it would degenerate into the usual Bart-bating after a few days, but still….. i do think about it.

Turner Cody incidentally, plays bass for Herman Dune when they tour. Another damn fine band criminally ignored and worth getting hold of. im talking about the early stuff particularly.

ho hum.. i vowed never to go near these blog things again after drunkenly setting up about ten of my own one night and forgetting my passwords. and here i am. such is life….

finally on the subject of other supposedly antifolk artists. i find most of the self proclaimed anti folk artists on this side of the pond are peddling something v different and mostly much less interesting than their US counterparts. take the time to listen to Charles Latham, Ish Marquez and Toby Goodshank, although as far as i know CL and IM are not based in New York these days. also dont forget Beck’s v early work was heralded as the precursor for antifolk as it has since become labelled.

thus spake the little withery one, over his glasses.

p.s. Bart. at Homegame. there’s gonna be ginger beardhair all over the fuckin place. Boooyaka.

The Raconteurs, if you are struggling to get into them, are just phenomenal live. That might chime a little better than the recorded stuff.

Ah, DC, I know what you mean. That’s where I came up with my guess about it just being a term for folk without the rinky-dinky. Folk without the prettiness, I think I called it. Although even that can’t be levelled at this, which is eminently well-stocked in the loveliness department.