Song, by Toad

After attending a birthday party which involved the scarfing of five pig’s heads yesterday I still don’t feel capable of eating anything. I may have to fast for the next few days before that little lot gets digested, in fact. Fucking hell that was a meal and a half.

There will be no giggenfun for me this week, unfortunately, despite a couple of natty lineups on the horizon. The label is going to require an absolutel shitload of admin work this week and if I go out gallvanting there is no way I am going to be able to get all of it done. We have Meursault single promos to do, Foxx promos, Split 12″ numbering, Maxwell Panther printing and label sampler cutting and folding. Then there’s the Fresh Air show on Wednesday with the Japanese War Effort, which I’m looking forward to.

Did everyone see that FOUND’s musical cupboard of magnificence won the BAFTA for Best Interactive Thingumajig? Well done lads, brilliant, and thoroughly deserved. Must have been a bit depressing for the others shortlisted though – how the fuck do you compete with something like the bloody Cybraphon?

Anyway, on with the task at hand. What should you be doing while I’m in the house folding paper, cutting out inserts and stuffing CDs into slip-cases? Well if you’ll hang on, I’ll tell you:

Wednesday 11th November 2009: The Pineapple Chunks, Ruthelise Snowe & Andy Brown at the Bowery.

I know little about this gig, so if anyone knows anything about who’s supporting please let me know in the comments. I’ve linked to an Andy Brown MySpace page, but I really don’t know if it’s the right one and, er, I can’t find Ruthelise Snow at all. The Chunks themselves however make, erm… mental guitar music basically. It’s off-kilter, surprisingly melodic and brilliant fun.

The Pineapple Chunks – Dark Halo

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Thursday 12th November 2009: Graham Coxon at the Queen’s Hall.

Most people I know absolutely love Graham Coxon, and cite his departure from Blur as the moment they became shit. That’s bollocks of course, because Think Tank is a great album, but that’s a whole new argument. Anyhow, here I am pootling along in my ignorance, with little real awareness of Coxon’s solo work and no more than a fairly casual liking for what little I have heard. The last album was really quite folky though, and I believe this is an acoustic setup, so that’s about all I can tell you.

Graham Coxon – All Has Gone

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Thursday 12th November 2009: The Leg, Your Loyal Subjects and Lipsync For a Lullaby play Versus at the Voodoo Rooms.

Apparently I sounded a little lukewarm on the concept the last time I mentioned the Versus gigs, but I really didn’t mean to be. All three bands will play separately, together and everything inbetween, and there will be inter-set entertainments as well. Basically it is going to be a gigantic musical mish-mash. The last one was apparently brilliant, so if Ted and his minions can pull that off again this should be a brilliant night.

Saturday November 14th: Riley Briggs from Aberfeldy at Carter’s Bar.

This is a free gig (Riley also plays alternate Thursdays down at the Shore in Leith, I believe) and will be a solo acoustic performance, but the band’s breezy indiepop should be perfectly suited to this kind of setup.

Aberfeldy – Love is an Arrow

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Saturday November 14th: Trashcan Sinatras, Brother Louis Collective & the Seventeenth Century at Cabaret Voltaire.

The Trashcan Sinatras are something of a blast from the past for me, I have to confess. I remember absolutely loving A Happy Pocket when I bought it back in my universoty days. I have to confess to having barely a clue what they’re up to these days, but I’d be really curious to see them. I don’t know Brother Louis Collective really, but the Seventeenth Century are excellent.

Trashcan Sinatras – The Therapist

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Saturday 14th November 2009: Panda Su, John B McKenna & the Last Battle play Trampoline at the Wee Red Bar.

The Last Battle are what happened when Thieves in Suits called it a day and I’ve heard very good things about them, without having had the chance to see them myself. Panda Su seem to be drawing all sorts of praise, and John B McKenna also sounds rather interesting. It’s a low-key lineup this one, but Euan has definitely found a really good spread of underground artists I’d personally like to see, and then kindly put them all in the same place on one evening for me.

This is our first attempt at a stunt podcast, live from a festival.  We go to festivals and I am trying to figure out how much work I can make for myself without taking the fun out of the festival for myself, or just generally trying too hard.

I didn’t really set up any interviews this time around – no, not even Billy Bragg – but I did manage to grab Mark from emerging Glasgow band The Seventeenth Century for a chat.  The audio is terrible, I’m afraid, but it should be just about audible.  If I’d been able to locate the keys for the Toad van at that point we’d have gone in there, just for a respite from the wind noises on the recording and the colossal amount of bleed from the main stage.

In any case, it should be entertaining enough, I hope, and with a bit of luck subsequent attempts at the same thing will be a lot better.

Toadcast #79 – The Wickerman

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

01. The Cave Singers – Beach House (04.04)
02. Julian Plenti – The Fun That We Had (07.31)
03. The Second Hand Marching Band – Mad Sense (15.37)
04. The Seventeenth Century – Mid October (22.59)
05. Celebrity Chimp – Pornstar (35.37)
06. The Lemonheads – The Outdoor Type (40.00)
07. The Human League – All I Ever Wanted (47.11)
08. The Go Team! – Feelgood by Numbers (50.25)
09. Meursault – Lament For a Teenage Millionaire (59.16)

I discovered The Seventeenth Century courtesy of Halina and her team of devilish minions over at Glasgow PodcART a couple of weeks ago.  I’ve tried emailing the band to see about buying a copy of their EP, but no response,  so I ended up having to just rip it off MySpace.  Still, I’m sure I’ll get the chance to make up for it in the future as I am pretty confident we will be hearing more from these lads over the next year or so.

People seem to be talking their folky-sounding acoustic indie with a liberal portion of electronica these days, so this sort of beautifully-conceived, gently swaying and rather sad music is appearing less and less on the iPods of your average skinny-jeaned hipster about town.  This is a shame, because when it is done as well as this, however familiar we might be with the general approach to making music, stuff like this still makes for a genuinely lovely, affecting experience.

The lead vocals are reedy, but the choral backing on songs like Traffic give a fullness to the sound.  The instrumentation is nicely managed, which creates a sound which is never too crowded.  Also, the rhythm has a lovely, slow rise and fall to it which gives the songs their air of slightly indulgent sadness, somewhat like witnessing a grey, rainy morning in the hills, but all whilst sat comfortably inside with a nice cup of tea.

So sonically we may have heard this before, to a degree, but this is still extremely well done and really gorgeous listening.  I await developments with considerable interest.

The Seventeenth Century – Mid October

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

It’s only four songs long, so you can only have one download I’m afraid – I don’t want to take the piss – but here’s a splendid video of Traffic to make up for it.  This is a really gorgeous song.

This week I am piling on the music snobbery.  Oh, okay, I’m not really – if anything I’m undermining it with some truly guilty pleasures.  There’s not much modern fluffy pop music which I happen to enjoy despite my snobbery because… well, because I just don’t think there’s anything I can think of which fits that bill at the moment.

I know nostalgic guilty pleasures and truly embracing low-brow music purely for the enjoyment of it aren’t quite the same thing but I think I’ve budged about as far as I am going to go on this one.  Girls Aloud are unlikely to ever make an appearance on this podcast, but there’s a spot of memory-tickling being indulged in with picks from Kylie and Guns ‘n’ Roses.  You can tell Mrs. Toad has been involved in choosing a playlist when it contains Guns and fucking Roses, but she was sacked from co-presenting duties due to excessive drunkenness, so her imprint on this particular episode is in selections only, and not in the presence of her dulcet tones on the interwaves.

Toadcast #70 – The Snobcast

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

01. Kid Canaveral – Couldn’t Dance (03.52)
02. Popup – Lucy, What Are You Trying to Say (07.04)
03. Art Fag – Nakhla Dog (15.48)
04. Kylie Minogue – Confide In Me (23.27)
05. Motorhead – Ace of Spades (28.50)
06. The Seventeenth Century – Mid October (36.16)
07. Alan Pownall – The Others (43.56)
08. Haggard the Listener Group – Blackette (47.29)
09. Soft Cell – Tainted Love (51.22)
10. Guns ‘n’ Roses – Sweet Child o’ Mine (58.12)