Random Bits of News
Firstly, well done to Elbow for winning the Mercury Prize. I tend to slag off the Mercury Prize a little bit, largely due to the appearance of tokenism (one for black people, one for intellectuals, one obscure one to make us look clever) but also because I often just don’t like many of the bands very much. The accusation of tokenism is neatly refuted by one of the judges in this nice little article in the Guardian, and an award dominated by my narrow taste would be dull as shit for everyone, so I suppose I should back off a little. At least it’s not the frothing, corporate nonsense of the NME awards or the joyless fogeyism of Q.
Anyway, whilst I acknowledge that it is somewhat hypocritical to crticise an award and then profess yourself pleased for the winners, I feel I really have to congratulate Elbow. If you listen to Guy Garvey on 6Music or go to any of the Elbow shows they really do seem to come across as a really nice bunch of lads, so it’s extremely good news in that respect. From a musical point of view it’s nice too. They were supposed to be the Next Big Thing when they released Asleep in the Back, but that hasn’t quite happened. They slipped a little, in my view, with Cast of Thousands, but between those two, Leaders of the Free World and the album for which they won the award, Seldom Seen Kid, they have put together a pretty consistently impressive collection of records.
A great band, and a bloody good result. Pimm’s all round.
Elbow – The Fix (Nice ironic choice, this one)
Elbow – Mexican Standoff
Secondly, Tennents Mutual have announced an amazing series of gigs throughout Scotland, all coming up over the next few months. They’ve done it by some slightly weird voting system which has had a couple of really notable results. Firstly, the venues are spread far and wide which is – although I am not all that delighted, living in Edinburgh – a great thing for Scotland and Scottish music as a whole. If you live in Dumfries, for example, when do you ever get to see a decent gig? The other thing that is brilliant is the pairing of established acts like King Creosote and Malcolm Middleton with up and comers Withered Hand and Rob St. John.
Here’s a sample lineup: Fort William, BA Club: King Creosote, The Pictish Trail, Chris ‘Beans’ Geddes (Belle & Sebastian).
Or how about this one: Ayr, Town Hall: Glasvegas, Laura Marling, Malcolm Middleton. Ayr fucking Town Hall? Blimey!
And congratulations to some friends of Toad for landing these slots:
Inverness, Ironworks: Teenage Fanclub, King Creosote, Rob St John.
Stirling, Tolbooth: Malcolm Middleton, Withered Hand.
Fat Sams, Dundee: Malcolm Middleton, Los Campesinos, Eagleowl.
Glasgow, CCA: James Murphy, Findo Gask, Kid Canaveral, Chris ‘Beans’ Geddes (Belle & Sebastian), David Barbarossa.
I have to confess I lost interest a little in Tennents Mutual due to the fact that from the outside very little seemed to be happening, and I saw too many uninspiring bands at the very top of the list – Muse, eck! Mob rule doesn’t always produce the best results. The fact that a lot of the very top bands weren’t up for it has resulted in a much better festival though, as far as I am concerned, and I love the lineups and the fact that they are in slightly less-travelled places.
Tennents interest me actually. They have sponsored some amazing things in Scotland – the Versacoustic gigs, the previously excellent T on the Fringe and the much-missed Triptych – but this year’s Edge Festival lineup was woefully thin, despite a few last minute gambits that did up the quality right at the death. I don’t know how much Tennents themselves have to do with the nature of the things they end up being involved with but all of the aforementioned stuff is bloody excellent. Triptych and Versacoustic were particularly interesting because it required genuine musical enthusiasm and knowledge to put together those kind of shows, and it’s rarer than purple fucking snow that corporate sponsorship embraces something so esoteric, eschewing the NME dross in favour of really making the effort to bring new and interesting things to people. Those shows actually took real risks in the name of helping people to broaden their horizons, and it’s a real shame they’re gone. Here’s hoping The Edge Festival can get its act together in future and that the excellent work of Triptych isn’t gone forever.
Malcolm Middleton – Superhero Songwriter
King Creosote – A Month of Firsts
Withered Hand – I Am Nothing
Not forgetting eagleowl playing with Malcolm Middleton and Los Campsinos! at Fat Sams in Dundee on 23rd Oct
Fuck, I missed that one. Sorry Bart!
Aye, like you I had a look at the Tennent’s Mutual site in the beginning but never really bothered to get involved greatly. The lineups are pretty decent though.
Well the final tallies of votes are pretty small for the tail end of the unsigned lot, so next time I will rally the troops on the site and try and flood the thing with my mates!
There’s a really nice Indian restaurant in Dumfries.
i found it far too late in the day.
Yeah, I think I was perhaps a bit too suspicious about it. I kind of felt that at the end of the day, someone else was always going to just look at the list and generally pick their own lineup, no matter how high my choices were in the listings, but I can’t really fault the end result though.
I think I didn’t put enough effort in because I was cynically convinced that the top picks would be shit anyway. Some of there were, but the actual lineups are really outstanding, and I wish I’d paid a bit more attention now.
For a moment there I thought I’d been black listed for calling the unbridled genius of Calexico into question.
He hasn’t put an Eagleowl tag on the post, Bart.
I’d say he might still be a bit miffed with you.
I don’t hate you for that, Bart.
I pity you.
The tennents mutual thing is a strange one, but I’m very excited and flattered to be involved at all.
What is most exciting is the balance between ‘Glasgow’ and ‘Edinburgh’ acts that made it through to the unsigned bit.
Not sure if this was a conscious effort on the organisers to keep it even, or just a reflection on the amount of quality acts coming out of the supposed “live music black spot” that is Edinburgh. Either way, it’s a very positive thing.
Watch out for Los Campesinos, though. Intoxicating live – you get all why the heck have I ignored/not liked this band? when you see them live; they are a very tight unit & produce a glorious ramshackle sing-a-long cacophonic tweeness. BUT, when you get back to the record itself it’s so weedy & under produced (lo-fi isn’t their natural home, it has to be said) you immediately forget them again.
p.s. Dylan, none of them are Welsh despite them constantly being touted as such or ‘from Cardiff’ — which translates as ‘they went to Cardiff Uni for a year & a bit’. In my book that makes them tourists.
Feel the need to defend the Los Campesinos album. One of the best things I’ve heard this year.
‘a glorious ramshackle sing-a-long cacophonic tweeness’ That’s exactly what I get from the album!
I don’t find the album weedy, but if they were a little heavier and darker they’d be ‘Johnny Foreigner’, wouldn’t they? And they sound similar enough already!
Two super bands though, producing a sound I haven’t heard much of before.
Seriously? Well perhaps I ought to pay it more attention then, because I’ve been really a bit too dismissive so far.
Apologies, Gav, but the album production is fucking awful & that’s exactly why I don’t like them. Plus, the female voice is fucking dreadful recorded. Live she’s muffled enough by the clatter of everything, but when produced it comes across as thin & (yes, sorry, live with it) weedy & just piss poor.
Don’t get me wrong, live they are brilliant – very tight & clattering. However, the main difference is the fatness of their sound & that is in no small part down to the sound engineer.
See them live, ignore the merch.
They haven’t popped up on my radar yet, actually.
I’ve heard the name being bandied about a bit but that’s it.
I shall have to check them out, but I’ll make sure I try and see through any artificial veneer of Welshness.
It’s all those leeks they insist on carrying about with them – just embarrassing.
I found this photo of them online…
They’re not fooling anyone are they?
They look more like the Tizer equivalent of the Tango bloke to me. Are they from Tizania?
Isn’t the cunt 2nd from left Stuart Cable ex of Sterophonics?
Stuart Cable? You mean BBC Radio Wales’ leading rock DJ?
I just can’t hear the production problem. I’ve tried. Just now with your comments in mind. There are a few albums in my collection that are spoiled by the production, some so much that it is hard to listen to. It can be frustrating, what might have been a good album is not and for once you don’t blame the band.
And then you slag off the female voice which is the main reason they nail that ‘tweeness’ factor you mention while preserving ‘their’ sound and not ticking all those Belle And Sebastian boxes that too many bands have ticked.
Anyway, agree to disagree and all that pleasant stuff. It will be interesting to see if you think they can achieve (if they are trying to achieve) their live sound a bit more on the next album. I think it is due out fairly soon.
(That photo was actually some Welsh fans at the World Cup in France last year.)
I just want to say – that Withered Hand song is great and gets better with every listen. Is that the one eagleowl covered at their ep launch? lovely stuff.
These are three fucking excellent songs.
Is no-one going to bite on the World Cup thing? Bugger.
I’ve ranted about Mercury myself, but I was also quite happy to hear Elbow won.
Gav, I can’t stand her voice on record (or his shout/sing delivery, for that matter). Or at least what the knob twiddler has done to highlight her lack of singing ability. & I don’t believe shit singing = twee. Shit singing has always been a factor of lo-fi or DIY long before ‘twee’* was first coined to lump together a group of bands who had little in common other than the fact they could hardly play their instruments. Belle & Sebastian never really fitted this category – they are ‘twee’ only in that they have a sugary/spring time/boy-girl/call & response/accent-heavy enunciation music dynamic.
As for the production – there’s no bass. It’s weedy & thin & wet.
There are tunes there (only almost, in some cases) that keep me interested but I can’t say it’s a 2nd album I’d rush to buy.
*It’s a difficult genre to pigeon hole, really. You have lyrical content that defines ‘tweeness’ (childish or childlike referencing & reminiscing or wordy/pesudo intellectual ‘i understand the shelving system in libraries’ wordery), types of instruments used (glocks, ukes, penny whistles or recorders, mini accordian squeeze boxes, casio keyboards, pretty much anything not out of place on Play School), singing voice (heavily affected vocals), clothing/aesthetic (a collision of mummy & daddy wardrobe dress up with Claire Grogan 1980 insensibilities).
Does twee not tend to get used as shorthand for intentionally and slightly archly cutesy these days? That’s what springs to my mind anyway, although that may be a perversion of the original meaning.
Yes, Toad. Exactamundo. Twee, as such, doesn’t exist these days outside of a catch-all to describe anyone who’s a bit clever-cute.
I’m clever and cute.
Does that make me twee?
No.
Twee music is virtually faux-naif, isn’t it? I don’t know, but maybe that’s how I might put it.
Okay. Elbow.
No, not really. Not for me, unfortunately.
They’ve never done anything to grab my attention up until now; but following all this Mercury-related hullaballoo I’ve made an extra special effort to have a listen and, regrettably, I’ve found them as dull as dishwater.
They’re constipated and the singer’s got a mouthful of marshmallows.
I feel sure I will live a long, happy and rich life if I never hear from them again.
Sorry.
You’ve been listening to music with fucking cauliflower in your ears again, haven’t you.