Not Just Local
At the start of the year I wanted to make this site more than just a random music blog and try and get a bit more involved in the Edinburgh music scene. Basically, I’ve not lived here long and I wanted to make some friends. Also, from a purely ideological point of view, I think that it’s all very well to talk music and so on, but actually being able to genuinely support people who you know and like and who are really trying to make things happen is a good thing to be doing. I wanted, I think, to feel like I was making a more concrete contribution.
I think that I have achieved that, in the sense that the Edinburgh music scene has been incredibly welcoming, and there is definitely something of a community feel starting to build here (steady on, Adam) but I do think that on occasion this has been to the detriment of my far-flung international audience.
Campfires & Battlefields introduces me to at least as much music as going to random gigs in Edinburgh. I get emails pretty regularly from him with this recommendation or that one. And let’s not forget that it was he who introduced me to Fleet Foxes, Loch Lomond, The Felice Brothers, Samamidon and numerous others who feature very highly in my recommendations for the year’s best albums.
I don’t want to get to the point where it is just me and my pals talking about our own little worlds, and anyone from outside that circle feels that they are in any way less welcome to join in. Simply put, I want this place to stay as open as possible, whilst still being something that my regular readers and commenters can think of as ‘theirs’ – a bit ambitious perhaps.
Anyway, while I was away in Portland C&B sent me a superb collection of new things which I am only now getting round to listening to. No disrespect to the man himself, but sometimes I am just a bit flaky that way. So here are what I think are the best of the stuff he sent. I am off to eMusic to see if I can download a few of them to listen to over the weekend. As should you be.
Caleb Engstrom – Nothing Cloud Lion
The Weather Station – East (A bit of Jolie Holland in here)
Very like the Willard Grant Conspiracy, but seeing as they are one of my favourite bands, I’m hardly complaining about that: Sam Lowry – Like the Kudzu Ivy
Forest Mountain Hymnal – Tremlett Spring
You’re a soppy git on times, aren’t you?
Well I don’t want all the naughty fun to make people feel that they are excluded. I like the random people from Swaziland who leave comments, and people like DC, Marcy, FiL, Adam, C&B were the lifeblood of this site for ages, so it’s really important that now that there are other people reading and commenting that they don’t feel that they are no longer appreciated.
Well said. not been speaking for very long, but have been reading and the variety of stuff that appears here is immense. Anyone contributing to that should be proud, and its no wonder that you take so long to get through the emails. Good job!
The wine’s going to my head….
Christ, woman, you’re plastered. I’ll nip down to the Wark and tell ‘em you’ve been on the sauce before work if you’re not careful.
Think of how pissed she’ll be by the time we get into the King’s Wark after Euan’s gig!
Oh hang on, that’ll be us.
We are NOT stalking the poor girl, least of all tonight when we’ll be plastered. We shall drink ourselves under the table elsewhere and leave her be.
Poor lass’ll end up having to call the police on us.
Awww… dad!
I think you should – then they’ll sack me and i’ll come out tonight and get more plastered. I’ve not thought this through!
I’m not too bad – i mean all i say….
I’ll likely be skulking around the shore begging to get served after my pub closes at 12 so may bump into y’all. If not, have a good one…….
OK so I’ve been totally immersed in work for the last few days and haven’t been paying as much attention to the goings on hereabouts as I usually do and as I’d like. I’ll catch up on earlier posts presently, but … Izzy is a woman?
I’m glad you like the stuff I sent Matthew and I appreciate the kind words and all. It’s funny because I actually feel far more attuned to the Edinburgh scene through this blog than I do to the DC/Northern Virginia scene where I live. I listen to Eagleowl, Meursault, The Savings and Loan, Emily Scott, Withered Hand and the rest (Kays Lavelle, where’s the CD?) all the time, but local DC bands only now and then. So, not only do I not feel excluded by the Edinburgh focus hereabouts, I actually relish that aspect of the blog most of all. It’s exposed me to a massive quantity of brilliant music that I would never have heard otherwise.
I (heart) you, you miserable fuckers.
C&B – I will be in Washington DC in October (from about 3rd until 15th, which means I celebrate my birthday there again) & am looking to try & get everyone I talk with through various webspaces/the radio show/etc. out for a night on the nectar at some point during that trip. Game?
Ha! I love the fact that a little ‘adam goes mental’ box comes up when you roll over that link. When everyone else started writing short little lists I did think ‘uh-oh’ for a moment but that was swiftly replaced by ‘fuck it’. I have a history of pitching up in communities of virtual communities of people who know each other anyway and just staying.
…but no history of proofreading what I’ve written before posting.
Mate, it was genius. Don’t regret it for a second.
What do you mean ‘Izzy is a woman…?’ Do i come across inadvertantly masculine?
Not at all, not at all! I guess I was led astray because Dylan thought your real name was Trevor, and also because the only other Izzy of my acquaintance is Izzy Stradlin, the excruciatingly masculine rhythm guitarist for Guns ‘N Roses.
And DC, a night on the nectar sounds delightful. I’ll be at the Nick Cave show on 10/4 and out of town for a few days surrounding the “Columbus Day” weekend (where we Americans celebrate the arrival of smallpox to North America), but other than that I’ll be available. If we’re gfoing to meet in person, however, you must promise not to make fun of my glass eye and hunchback. I’m sensitive, and given to fits.
Don’t let the internet goblins out of their basements DC, it isn’t safe!
Downright surreal that you two will meet up for a pint and I’ve met neither of you.
We met DC’s mate at the Village last night though.
The world really is a small place.
I’m think I’m going mad. The opening ceremony for the Paralympics is on the telly while I sit here, I’m not really paying much attention to it, but I’m sure the commentator just said “A great way to endear yourself at the paralympics is to throw badgers into the crowd.”
Oh, badges.
Fuck me.
C&B – working on the whole recording thing. promise. should be a couple of new demo’s on myspace soon.
Click here to have a look at the photos from Friday night.
DC, apparently the chap in the last photo is an acquaintance of yours..