The Stiffcast is not the cheap innuendo I am sure you assume it to be.  No no no, not that sort of stiff, the sort where every joint and muscle in your body aches because you are woefully out of shape and attempting to run around like a teenager.  That sort of stiff.

Yes, after three months out with a groin strain (no sniggering at the back, please) I have tried to go back to the gym and to five-a-sides over the last week or two with what can only be described as somewhat mixed results. I am sure it didn’t use to be this hard to get back in the saddle, as it were.

The one undeniable result, however, is that I have been hobbling around like an old man, because every morning without fail I have been stiff as a fucking board with aching muscles and sore joints. This must be what it’s like to wake up as C3PO.

Toadcast #259 – The Stiffcast by Song, By Toad on Mixcloud

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01. The Black Tambourines – Ghost at a Party (Toad Session) (00.25)
02. Jonnie Common – Figurehead (Dry) (05.57)
03. Peace Arrow – Gems (11.27)
04. The Hundredth Anniversary – The Jump (15.05)
05. Shiny Darkly – Diana (20.27)
06. The Android Angel – Her Shoulders (27.27)
07. Weeknight Sinners – Give Me a Taste (35.07)
08. True Gents – Honeycomb Heart (39.57)
09. North American War – Geraniums on a Spit (47.46)
10. Mat Riviere – Wool (54.20)

It’s been a very, very long time since we had a nice simple podcast of me just chattering about music without extraneous distractions of various drunken people babbling to one another over the top of it.

Last week was Ruth, Michael and Dylan, the week before that was Vic and Peej, then me and Mrs. Toad and then there was the one from Homegame, which was nuts, so this one is just calm and sensible and plain vanilla and basically just me playing some songs, wondering how to pronounce names like Borcherdt, and talking pish like usual.

Next week will be the Mumford & Sons Toad Session, which is nice.

Toadcast #116 – The Dead Calmcast

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01. The Van Allen Belt – The Way You Look (02:14)
02. Songdog – Gene Autry’s Ghost (08.50)
03. Over the Wall – Settle Down (16.56)
04. Deathpodal – Squirrel and the Fox (20.55)
05. Brian Borcherdt – While I was Asleep (28.27)
06. Emit Bloch – Dorothy (34.34)
07. David Thomas Broughton – Perfect Louse (40.49)
08. Mat Riviere – FYH (43.09)
09. Member of the Wedding – New Century (51.37)
10. The Sequins – Offside & Beautiful (57.09)

There is a certain shambolling self-deprecation to an awful lot of home recorded material, almost as if in some sense it felt it had to apologise for itself.  Mat Riviere’s new album may have a lot of the home recorded aesthetic about it, but it doesn’t feel like it has to excuse itself.

I think this is related to the presence of his voice, which has solidity and character, lending an air of gravitas to an album full of kitchen percussion and wonky piano.  The slow, steady rhythms also bring an air of surprisingly relentless purpose, making Follow Your Heart the kind of record which feels like it’s disquietingly staring you down across a crowded bar.  You wonder if continuing to meet its gaze will result in a fight you don’t want, then you wonder if looking away will do the same thing, and you end up frozen and slightly panicked, but unable to turn away.

I don’t have the ear to tell, of course, but this album sounds like it was recorded entirely in someone’s front room* with an electronic backing track humming and popping along, overlaid with handclaps, what sounds like a melodica, and some rather portentous organ sounds. It’s an odd mixture of the rickety and the robust, which might be at the heart of its appeal.

I can easily imagine people finding Follow Your Heart a little bit one-paced after a couple of listens, but once you’re more into it I think you’ll find the shift of the underlying rhythms, from skittish to sad to bordering on industrial, brings with it subtle but important changes of mood.  Curse These Eyes and Evening Drive are quite foreboding, Godless Girl more enigmatic and ethereal, and early songs like Castroeale desperately looking for a bit of optimism somewhere.  The changes in instrumentation and emotional foundation may not be huge, but they keep the feel of the album shifting on slightly uncertain sands as it progresses, which stops it ever slipping into a rut and becoming boring.

It’s taken me a little while to get into this, though, I must confess.  I knew I liked the sounds from the very first listen, but it took a few more goes to develop an emotional attachment to the individual songs.  Initially I think the latent menace in a couple of them perhaps kept me at arms length, and it took a little while for the intimacy of tracks like Lamplight to extend a more welcoming hand.  Since that has happened, however, I have been really enjoying this.

Mat Riviere – Evening Drive

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Mat Riviere – Godless Girl

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* Just have a look at his MySpace page and it would appear that this guess is not far from the truth.