I actually ended up buying John Grant a coke at SXSW this year, a little oddly.  At the last minute he filled in for a cancellation at the Bella Union/4AD showcase, and took the stage in front of a relatively unassuming-looking electric piano in standard SXSW beard and checked shirt.

I was expecting the music which tends to go with that particular uniform – harmonious alt-country, or something thereabouts – and yet suddenly this massive voice emerged, bursting forth from songs which, whilst they fit well with the dreamy, folky Bella Union back catalogue, have just a little bit of Broadway about them.

After that performance, which was really, really good, I suddenly found myself standing next to him at the bar.  I told him that I’d enjoyed the set, and he offered to buy me a beer with one of his artists’ tokens.  It turned out they didn’t work, so I bought the round, including a coke for Mr. Grant.  Not a particularly compelling little anecdote, but there you go.

To suggest slight similarities to a blend of Elton John, the Scissor Sisters and Rufus Wainright sounds painfully automatic when you realise that Grant is in fact gay, and that this fact has troubled him to the point of contemplating suicide by the time he finished this record.  It’s not though, and I promise I made those connections before reading anything about his background.  Equally, scenting a bit of Midlake in the mix was something I noticed before I discovered that Midlake are close personal friends of his, and that they loved his music so much that they were the ones who persuaded him to make the album in the first place, and indeed are the backing band you hear on the record.

That kind of slightly countrified, dreamy broadway pop is rarely my kind of thing, I have to confess, and as such I had kind of stopped paying attention to this record after the first couple of songs and started to concentrate more on whatever else it was I was doing.  Then came the line in Sigourney Weaver about “I feel just like Sigourney Weaver/ when she had to kill those aliens” and I honestly stopped dead.  It was a genuine double-take moment: ‘What the fuck did he just sing?  Noooo, surely not.’

Anyhow, given that my attention had been very definitely grabbed (albeit in a slightly surreal manner) I then began to listen more closely.  Lyrically, this album has a lot of depth and a lot of darkness and a very oddly undecorated way of expressing itself.  JC Hates Faggots is a really jarring yet jolly little song which, when you listen to it, is a truly brutal take on Grant’s own religious upbringing, yet plinks and plonks along in the most unassuming manner.  And this song is far from alone in wielding this kind of utterly unvarnished emotional punch.

I don’t think the music of this record is ever anything I will entirely warm to, I must confess.  It just isn’t my kind of thing.  But I am still going to listen to it again and again, just to hear the lyrics, so surreally shrouded in sugary sweet, swoonsome pop music, it gives the whole album a truly disturbing feel.

John Grant – JC Hates Faggots

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John Grant – Where Dreams Go to Die

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Another stunt podcast for you, this was recorded on Sunday night after and afternoon of beer and Margaritas on South Congress in Austin – probably the most enjoyable day of the whole festival for me actually, and one which involved no more music than walking past the queue for an Alejandro Escovedo show.

What it did involve, however, was breakfast tacos, a splendid Mexican tat shop, a Western supply shop full of incredibly cool cowboy boots and shirts and so on, and then an afternoon sitting in the sun and shooting the breeze with Peej, Vic, Alex from Fatcat and Ben from Instinctive Raccoon.  Oh, and repeatedly having people spill beer on my jeans, there was that as well.

Anyhow, in the evening we were joined by Stuart from the Scottish Arts Council (who does a highly passable impersonation of Groundskeeper Willie from the Simpsons) and recorded this rather messy podcast before, erm… going bowling with Broken Social Scene and We Were Promised Jetpacks, sort of.  Actually, that’s rather an exaggeration.  We went to a fantastically cool bowling alley place to eat, and then those two bands, who seem to have become friends, wandered in, ate something, said hello and then proceeded to spend the rest of the evening bowling.  I wouldn’t recognise Broken Social Scene of course, but apparently that’s who they were, and it did lend the evening a slightly surreal tinge.

Toadcast #114 – The South by Southcast

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01. We Were Promised Jetpacks – It’s Thunder and it’s Lightning (02.53)
02. The Entrance Band – Grim Reaper Blues (11.33)
03. Shearwater – Black Eyes (20.49)
04. Broken Social Scene – Let’s Get Out of Here (Live at Radio Aligre) (24.17)
05. Hudson Mohawke – Fuse (33.59)
06. Midlake – Young Bride (41.31)
07. The Real Heroes – Baby Must’ve Known (46.07)
08. Plants & Animals – Jacques (56.19)
09. Dan Mangan – Robots (63.09)
10. Gay Witch Abortion – Down With Giants (73.07)

Well I am sure that any of you who really give a shit what’s happening at South by Southwest this week will have found out from one of the more dilligent blogs who have been writing daily updates.  Honestly though, I doubt anyone who regularly reads this site would have really expected me to be one of those blogs.

I got to Austin at about ten or eleven at night on Wednesday and stumbled into town to find Peej, who kindly offered to put me up, and Vic Galloway, who along with Peej is one of about four people I know in Austin this week, at the Scottish Showcase.

Due to not having bothered with either a badge or a wristband and the place being absolutely jam-packed, Peej had to sneak me in the back door, getting rid of a bouncer with a vague sort of ‘I’m in the band’ response which rather miraculously seemed to work.  Peej had a badge which he waved and that did the trick.

I saw the tail end of the Jetpacks show, which people went absolutely mental for.  I have never been a big fan of the band, honestly, but Peej loves them and they seem to be going down an absolute storm in the States.  They certainly do put on a good show too, so it’s hard not to warm to them.  After some quality MCing by Mr. Galloway, with an enormous super jumbo extra helping of cheese, Frightened Rabbit took to the stage and they really were good.

I gave their new album a bit of a savaging, and in the comments section there was a bit of discussion about how the songs would come across in a live setting, free of the smothering production.  I also said that a lot of the guitar sound on Winter of Mixed Drinks was really good, or at least what little of it you could hear, and live this really is what dominates the songs.  The new stuff fits in perfectly with the older songs, and when they are just played on guitar I enjoyed them miles more than on the record.

On Wednesday night I slept like a fucking corpse, and wandered into town at about three or four o’clock in the afternoon.  First port of call was the Hype Machine to meet Dev Sherlock, who has had the unenviable task of editing our hour longs chats down in to concise five minute soundbites for Hype Machine Radio.  It turns out that instead of simply being a nice bloke on the internet, he actually has a rather storied history as a music journalist and instead of going to a lot of music stuff we wandered off to the Ironworks to eat burned meat and pickles with a beer on the deck.  It was very, very civillised and finally meeting someone who’s been an internet friend for a couple of years now was a rather strange pleasure.

On the subject of internet friends, I finally met a certain Campfires and Battlefields on Thursday evening at the 4AD/Bella Union showcase.  I went in with the Broken Records lads to see them, Efterklang and Midlake, and ended up also catching an excellent set by John Grant, whose new album is out on Bella Union in a few weeks.  He used to be in a band called Czars, who I also rather liked, and he sounded really good.  When he sat down I expected something a bit like Bon Iver, but in fact it was probably closer to Rufus Wainright than anything else.  Very promising, in any case.

Efterklang weren’t bad, and I am not going to go on about Broken Records (great idea – travel all the way to Texas just to go and see bands from Edinburgh).  The real revelation of the night for me was just how good Midlake were, however.  I saw them at the End of the Road Festival a couple of years ago and they were no better than pretty good, and their new album was pretty much like that as well: really enjoyable, but didn’t exactly blow me away.  In the rather fantastic surroundings of Buffalo Billiards in Austin, however, they were pretty brilliant.  The harmonies were gorgeous, and I have no idea why they needed five bloody guitarists, but the sound they made was so nice that you can’t really question them on that count.

And of course, just before the Midlake set, Jamie Broken Records tapped me on the shoulder and said ‘I think there’s someone here you should meet – a certain Mr. Campfires and Battlefields…’

I don’t know why I don’t hate this album, but I don’t.  I’ve seen it given a right slagging, and I can’t argue with any of the reasons – it’s just like the last one, but without the incredibly infectious tunes, there’s no real progress, no ambition, just a fairly straightforward reproduction of a previously successful recipe with pretty much nothing added to really merit us spending our money on something which they basically did better about three years ago.

I don’t hate this, however, because the above comments may lessen my objective regard for this album, but they don’t seem to have much impact on my subjective enjoyment of it.  One of the benefits of not pushing on from the Van Occupanther template is that this retains a lot of the charms of the previous record, so it’s lush, dreamy and has that lovely vocal and electric guitar sound.  The whole thing just lulls me into a relaxed and comfortable frame of mind, and where often that would annoy me in a record, in this case I rather enjoy it.

I can’t honestly recommend anyone buy this.  It’s enjoyable and all, but if you already have Van Occupanther you don’t need this, and if you have neither you should really buy Van Occupanther.  Nevertheless, I find it difficult to harbour any real grudge against The Courage of Others because it’s just a good listen.  I can, however, entirely understand why some people are so irritated with it.

Oh, and Bring Down has a rather surprising patch of Radiohead in it for some reason.  Which is nice.

It’s been an odd week on Song, by Toad, for me surprisingly liking some very ‘pleasant’ albums.  Maybe it’s just the mood I’m in, or maybe it’s a case of early-onset middle aged listening habits, but recently I seem to have been surprisingly welcoming of music which is just plain nice, without being all that challenging, or in some cases even all that interesting.  Oh well, probably nothing in it, just don’t think I’ve gone all Radio 2 on your asses, I promise it’s not permanent.

Midlake – Acts of Man

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Midlake – Core of Nature

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My what a splendid festival. You’ve read what I had to say about the thing (overview, day one, day two & day three), now here’s the ‘downloadable in one easy to digest chunk’ version, with more tunes.

I had a splendid time at this, I really did. The line-up was spectacularly good and, despite being not much more than a well-executed variant on the standard festival format, I would highly recommend it to those of you sick of the exercise in cattle-herding and aggressively intrusive marketing that the modern festival has become.

Anyhow, I’ve gone through the festival in chronological order, playing songs from artists in the order in which I attended them over the weekend. Hopefully I give you a decent overview of the festival itself as well as a taster of the quality of the lineup, from the indie legends to the connoisseur’s selection of emerging acts that made this such a quality bill. No ranting in this one either, or at least, very little. What a relief for you all.

Toadcast #12 – The End of the Roadcast

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1. Midlake – Young Bride (02.08)
2. Yo La Tengo – By the Time it Gets Dark (07.43)
3. My Brightest Diamond – Dragonfly (14.17)
4. King Creosote – You’ve No Clue Do You (23.19)
5. Monkey Swallows the Universe – Sheffield Shanty (28.29)
6. David Thomas Broughton – Unmarked Grave (34.56)
7. British Sea Power – Remember Me (46.11)
8. Port O’Brien – Five & Dime (51.39)
9. The Young Republic – Excuses to See You (56.14)
10. The Wave Pictures – Long Island (63.28)
11. Johnny Flynn & the Sussex Wit – Tickle Me Pink (70.44)
12. Paris Motel – My Demeter (77.20)
13. Charlie Parr – Worried Blues (80.53)
14. Howe Gelb – Get to Leave (88.34)
15. Lambchop – Up With People (95.35)

Due to automobile, exhaustion, tent and stupidity issues I arrived at Larmer Tree Gardens extremely late on the Friday which meant I missed the Willard Grant Conspiracy, who had an oddly early slot, and Stephanie Dosen. This is particularly irritating as the Willards are one of my favourite groups, but never mind. There’s a new album approaching so they’ll presumably be touring soon enough.

The Willard Grant Conspiracy – Dance With Me (Live)

Fortunately, after wrestling with the tent, I was in time to stroll up to the main gardens and have a leisurely pint – hardly an queue, people, at a festival! Oh the gods are kind – before wandering up to the main Garden Stage.

Midlake: I have read that some people found their set tailed off a bit towards the end, but I didn’t see it that way. They are another of those ‘perfect reproduction’ live bands who reel off their songs in a manner largely indistinguishable from the album. Sometimes this annoys me a little, but not at a festival where there will be so many other live performance styles on show, so I just enjoyed the fact that their songs really are very, very good. I haven’t listened to Van Occupanther much for a while now and this really reminded me what a good album it is. Their brand of slightly hippy 70s Americana is really rather gorgeous, perfect for a first show of the weekend.

Midlake – Young Bride

Yo La Tengo: They were the headline act for Friday night and the only other group I saw that evening. Truly, they are fucking legends. They’ve been playing, and playing together, for so long they can pretty much do anything they want at the moment. Ira is a demented genius with the guitar when he gets going, and their changes of pace and sound from one song to another are amazing. When I got back to my tent my neighbours were discussing this band they’d never seen before that didn’t know if it was death metal, a jazz combo or electronica. Hmm, I thought, there’s only one group that can be! Honestly though, this was an amazing, blistering performance. I’ve seen them play a couple of times before and it was the same then. Basically, Yo La Tengo are one of the best bands on the planet at the moment, full stop. Truly fantastic.

Yo La Tengo – Double Dare
Yo La Tengo – Our Way to Fall

And that was it for the day. I tried to pop over to the Bimble Inn to see Eugene McGuinness because I’ve heard some great things about him, but I found Tim from The Daily Growl instead. The crowd was too big, and given we couldn’t get near him or hear him play decided to give up and chat over a bevvy. Maybe another time for Eugene.

Eugene McGuinness – Myrtle Parade

Gosh it’s multi-post bonanza of obsessive lunacy on Song, by Toad today. I know this is far too many posts for a sane human being, but honestly the news today is bringin’ the crazy and there’s no way I could let it pass without a round of applause.

Item No1: Paris & the Mystery Meat
Everyone’s favourite talentless whore has been released and gave an interview to CNN in which she described her meals in the Big House as containing “mystery meat”, which she then rather perplexingly described as “really scary”. Seriously. Anyone here remember the last time Ms. Hilton had any sort of difficulty wolfing down mystery meat with all the glassy-eyed enthusiasm of a sedated Alzheimer’s patient? No, me neither. At least true to form she’s still talking about god, albeit in slightly different context than usual, playing that time-honoured Get Out Of Jail Free Card that the American public never seem to tire of falling for.

Rufus Wainright – Old Whore’s Diet

Item No2: Tom Cruise: Verrückt und Verboten!
Or, bonkers and banned, as we’d (vaguely) have it in English. Apparently he has been banned from filming his latest movie in Germany – allegedly about Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg’s failed 1944 assassination attempt on Hitler – because they think he’s just a bit too mad. If they’re worried about his inability to accurately portray sensitive historical material then fuck me, how are they not attempting to extradite Mel Gibson for public tarring and feathering? Honestly, I’ll be gutted if they ban Scientology. Scientology is easily the coolest religion in the world – a great big fuck you to people who believe in the preposterous things that infest every religion. Walking on water? Resurrection? Virgin birth? Chicken feed! That’s primary school make-believe, that is. Try great big fucking flying spaceships and alien beings and volcanoes, you pussies! It really makes the other religions look like they just weren’t really trying when they came up with their creation myths.

Also, it’s like a great big finger of deranged lunacy that points helpfully at every single one of its hilariously credulous followers reminding us all to point and laugh every time they raise their heads above the parapet. Fucking idiots.

Ballboy – Essential Wear For Future Trips to Space

Item No3: Best Oddly Not Good Enough
Real Madrid, having won precisely bollocks all of any import for five years have finally won the league title in Spain. Fabio Capello, the man who guided them to this momentous triumph, has needless to say, been sacked immediately. Now, they didn’t win it in style, and Barca may have imploded spectacularly to clear the way, but sacked? Scolded, maybe. Told to do better, perhaps. But the first title in five years and he’s sacked – are these people on drugs? Well, high on their own galactic levels of vanity perhaps…

Midlake – Excited But Not Enough From back when they sounded just like Radiohead.

Item No4: Beware the Ghost Ducks
Yes, seriously. 30,000 rubber duckies were washed overboard when a particularly enthusiastic storm hit their container ship in the middle of the Pacific back in 1992. Due to the vagaries of global oceanic currents they circled, as a group, around the North Pacific for years until a misadventure with Arctic pack ice spat them out, bleached a deathly white, into the Atlantic early in the new millennium. After flirting with America’s Eastern Seaboard they are now caught in the Gulf Stream which should bring them en masse to the shores of Ireland, Cornwall and the Southwest later this year. Christ, you’d think you were mad, wouldn’t you. A 30,000-strong fleet of ghostly rubber duckies approaching your shores – it’d be terrifying!

Crash Test Dummies – How Does a Duck Know?

Makes all that boring shit about people dying in Iraq by the thousands and the increasingly militant stance of the Russian government and the slippery avoidance of any sort of accountability by Dick Cheney seem like no more than the hum of a distant bee, doesn’t it.

Mrs Toad and myself went to Bestival on the Isle of Wight last year and, although we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves, I must admit that this year I was after something a little smaller. There’s something rather uninspiring about bald fields covered in a sea of broken plastic cups and a two hour queue for warm beer. Once the truly abysmal Bestival lineup for 2007 was announced – Beastie Boys, Chemical Brothers, Primal Scream? Have I gone back in time by ten years or something? – I decided that was it, I was looking for something smaller and far more friendly. Sod the bands, I just want a nice weekend.

Well I’d exchanged a few emails with Simon from End of the Road Records about The Young Republic, who are superb and recently signed to the label. I knew the label had formed from the End of the Road Festival so I thought it might be a good one to take a chance on. There wasn’t much in the lineup that I recognised, but what the hell – a festival full of smaller, less well known bands would be quite fun. And besides, Howe Gelb was on there, so that did it for me and I bought a couple of tickets.

That was something in the region of a month ago. Since then that lineup has just got better and better, as Simon has dropped one gem after another into the mix. This morning they announced Midlake and Yo La Tengo. I can’t believe it! Suddenly instead of just looking forward to this, I am excited as little boy.

Full line-up thus far (I’ve highlighted the ones I think are interesting and provided a few samples – although I haven’t used the little player this time as the javascript would slow the whole page down too much with this many links, sorry):

Alessi (music)
Archie Bronson Outfit
Architecture In Helsinki - Heart it Races
The Bees
Besnard Lakes – Cedric’s War
Brakes
The Broken Family Band
C. W. Stoneking
Charlie Parr
The Congregation
Dan Sartain
Darren Hayman
David Thomas Broughton
David Vandervelde
Devastations
Euros Childs
Findlay Brown
Fionn Regan
Herman Dune
Howe Gelb – Pontiac Slipstream
Hush the Many
Hyacinth House
Indigo Moss
James Yorkston – Someplace Simple
Jeffrey Lewis
Jim White
Joan As Police Woman
Johnny Flynn – Brown Trout Blues
Josh T Pearson
King Creosote – Missionary
Micah P Hinson – I Still Remember
Midlake – Van Occupanther
Misty’s Big Adventure
Monkey Swallows the Universe
My Brightest Diamond
Paris Motel - Entrez Dans la Salpetriere
Pete and the Pirates
Port O’Brien
Reigns
Richard Swift
Seasick Steve
Slow Club
Sons of Noel and Adrian
Stephanie Dosen – Vinalhaven Harbour
Sunny Day Sets Fire
Super Furry Animals
Telegrams
The Twilight Sad – And She Would Darken the Memory
Viking Moses
Woodpigeon – Home
Yo La Tengo – Tom Courtenay
The Young Republic – Your Heart Belongs in Tennessee

Now all Simon has to do is pull off some miracle of scheduling that allows me to see absolutely all these bands, as well as leaving some space for me to check out some of the new ones. Good luck, mate!