Well if there’s any shit going down in Edinburgh this week I am not going to be there to enjoy it.  Not out of shame at having just used the term ‘shit going down’ as if I was a teenager in the nineties, but because my gigfuns will be happening in London and Glasgow this week.

Tomorrow I am in London to see Rob St. John and Neil from Meursault play at the Vortex, and then on Thursday I’ll be in Glasgow for the Fence Records Christmas party.  And funnily enough, with Detour, Frightened Rabbit and Jill O’Sullivan coming through to Edinburgh on the same night as the latter, it seems the two cities will be swapping musical populations for a week.

Then on Sunday we have a gig by three of the most promising lo-fi garage rock bands I’ve come across this year – Dolfinz, Joanna Gruesome and The Black Tambourines.  This will be a bit messy, but also really fucking loud and (mostly) tuneful!

Anyhow, I have a pile of things to tell you about this week, including something rather good on tonight, assuming you can get down to Leith in time…

[Edit:  balls, just going through my emails and realised I missed this: Plastic Animals, Trapped Mice and Supermarionation at the Wee Red Bar on Thursday 15th Dec. - sorry!]

Monday 12th Dec: Taperecorder, Hailey Beavis & Dusty Cut at the Shebeen Bar.

The Shebeen is in what used to be the Old Dock bar down near Commercial Quay in Leith, and this is the first of a series of nights of free music, which promises good things.  Leith has needed something like this since the Leith Tape Club went quiet at the start of the year.  Taperecorder also sound really interesting too, like either an indie, an experimental or a techno band, depending on what moment of what song you happen to catch.

Taperecorder – Gravel Mountain

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Friday 16th Dec: Papi Falso at Henry’s Cellar Bar.

Papi Falso is the perfect club for people who aren’t that into clubs.  The music is fucking awesome, and you can either go nuts on the dancefloor or lean at the bar and have a pint.  Guess which one I tend to favour?

Saturday 17th Dec: Kid Canaveral‘s Christmas Baubles at Summerhall.

This is another all-day Christmas shindig, with performances from the Canaverals themselves, eagleowl, Slow Club, Josie Long, Sweet Baboo and a pile of others, and is being held in pretty much Edinburgh’s most charismatic new venue: Summerhall. I’ll be there. You’ll spot me easily because I’ll be the really drunk one.

Kid Canaveral – And Another Thing!!

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Saturday 17th Dec: Fuzzy Star, The Oates Field & The Occasional Flickers at Sneaky Pete’s.

With Kid Canaveral already sold out, this is a fine alternative for those too slow to get tickets.  Fuzzy Star were excellent at the Ides of Toad earlier in the year, although I suspect this is likely to be a full band set, fleshing out the awkward acoustic introspection with a somewhat fuller sound.  The Oates Field make a cracking racket, and the Occasional Flickers do swoonsome indie-pop as well as anyone in Edinburgh.

The Oates Field – Nae Luck

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Sunday 18th Dec: Doflinz, Joanna Gruesome & The Black Tambourines play The Ides of Toad at Henry’s Cellar Bar.

I am really looking forward to this one.  All three bands play rough and ready, lo-fi garage stuff, but still keep enough tunes in there that you aren’t just battered with a racket.  This should be messy and loud though, and might well be my final gig of the year.

Dolfinz – Coral Reefer

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Joanna Gruesome – Madison

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The Black Tambourines – Bad Days

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This is the post-Homegame, ‘dear Jesus please just let me sleep for a week, good god someone please fetch me a green vegetable’ podcast.

I can just about keep my head together enough to get through this, but then I have the Monday listings to write and the bloody Francois/This is the Kit/Babe gig to organise tonight as well.  Aargh!

I also have all sorts of other things to do this week, but after the sort of mind-boggling battering your mind and your liver get at Homegame I am not sure I can face any of it.  I am going back to sleep, wake me up in June.

Direct download: Toadcast #173 – The Brokencast

01. FOUND – I’ll Wake With a Seismic Head No More (00.34)
02. Randolph’s Leap – Counting Sheep (7:57)
03. Josh T. Pearson – Country Dumb (Piano Version) (13.57)
04. The Singleman Affair – If I Only Fell in Love When I Was Young (21.16)
05. eagleowl – Into the Fold (Toad Session) (29.00)
06. The Last Battle – Ruins (35.07)
07. King Creosote & the Earlies – Bats in the Attic (Live on 6Music with Mark Riley) (40.23)
08. Sweet Baboo – Girl Under a Tree (45.37)
09. David Thomas Broughton – Ain’t Got No Sole (54.57)

Welcome to the second installment of the Song, by Toad Festive Fifty for 2010.  Yesterday I explained why I am going to have to exclude Song, by Toad Records music from my end of year lists from now on, and today I am going to explain (i.e. make feeble excuses for) some of the inconsistencies and idiosyncrasies you might perceive in this particular list.

There are certain albums, for example, which just don’t yield edited highlights all that easily.  There are no songs by Mount Erie or The Books, for example, because I found it next to impossible to disentangle individual songs from their records – this does not, of course, mean that I don’t love the albums.

In other cases, bands have been somewhat penalised by having too many good songs.  Micah P. Hinson, for example could have had loads of songs on here, because I bloody loved his album, but I tried to restrict the number of times any one band appeared on the list.  Basically, once a band had a song on here, the second one was treated a little more harshly, and third even more so.  It wasn’t systematically done by any means, but I just wanted to represent as broad a selection of bands as possible.

And finally, I suppose it kind of goes without saying, but don’t pay too much attention to the specific order of these songs.  Ask me on a different day and I would probably sort them differently.

11. Sam Amidon – Pretty Fair Damsel It’s rare that I hear pretty much anything played as a Toad Session and still end up preferring the full studio version, there’s just something so special about seeing your favourite songs played live in your own living room.  This, however, is just amazing.  As much as I love Sam’s voice, in this case I think the way the rich, beautiful backing just twinkles its way through the song is what really sets it apart.

12. Jason Lytle – Liquid Hyper Tweeker Energy Drinks If ever a song embodied its subject matter, then it’s this one, with a hyperactive electronic signature harrassing the song from start to finish.

13. David Tattersall – The Typewriter Ribbon David Tattersall is probably starting to get a bit sick of people going on about his lyrics, because it kind of implies that his actual songwriting isn’t good enough to merit mention on its own.  Once again though, one of the chief reasons I love this song is the fantastic lyrical content, but to labour that aspect would be to do all the others a massive disservice.  There is a lot of sax in this song, for example.  Yes, sax!  And you know what, it’s fucking cool too!

14. Hezekiah Jones – I Love My Family Here’s a free tip for anyone starting up a brand new label from scratch: have something as utterly beautiful as this on your first release and you will be well on your way.  Fucking gorgeous.

15. Kid Canaveral – Her Hair Hangs Down Ever since that video I suspect Kid Canaveral might be growing a little tired of people telling them how great this song is, especially for a band who play some of the most upbeat, infectious pop tunes you could hope to hear.  But if Broken Records have to put up with me constantly picking their sad songs, then this lot can bloody well take it too.

16. Male Bonding – Year’s Not Long This is nothing like as rough and ready as their earlier stuff, or so I am told, but there is a furious pace and a reckless rhythm to it which brings what is essentially no more than a first rate pop song to life with incredible vim and relish.  They just batter through this with such joyous disregard that you get the impression they might have their next album recorded by the end of the week if only we wouldn’t keep demanding they play the song they’d just finished over and over again.

17. Sweet Baboo – I’m a Dancer The contrast between the loveliness of the music and the darkness of the lyrics on this song is really quite disconcerting.  There’s also an odd mixture of self-loathing and leering arrogance about this as well, which just adds to that conflict, despite being a pretty sort of song your mum might well hum along with.

18. Perfume Genius – Mr. Petersen The possible undertones of sexual abuse – or at the very least, of the unspecifically sexually inappropriate – in this song give an almost unbearable emotional weight.  The whole album has that, actually, and this song might be one of the poppier ones, but still devastating if you actually think too much about it.

19. Sam Amidon – Way Go Lily The rolling, repeating lyrical refrain in this song give it an hypnotic quality, particularly the way the vocals cut through the swirling orchestration.  There’s barely any actual lyrical content to speak of, but the vocals are layered and interwoven like part of the orchestra.

20. Onions – I Want to be a Dancer Some of you might point out that this song was actually released in 2009, not 2010, and is therefore ineligible for this list.  I would point out to you that this is my fucking website and I will do what the fuck I like with it.  So by virtue of the ‘I will make exceptions as and when I fucking well please’ clause, this counts.  For a website most commonly described as supporting Scottish music, I think I’ve found out more about Manchester this year than anywhere else, including my first contact with this massive pop diamond by Onions.

21. David Tattersall – The Old Family Aside from writing truly incredible lyrics, David Tattersall plays a mean guitar.  If The Typewriter Ribbon was all about the lyrics and the sax, this is all about that guitar rhythm.  I am really itching for The Wave Pictures next album to go nuts with the guitar, because it’s really fucking awesome when they do that.

22. The National – Little Faith My reasons for picking this would be the same as almost any other song on this album: defiant warmth, and resolute gravitas.  Why do I like this one marginally better than the others?  Dunno, just do.

23. Warm Ghost – Claws Overhead I know this is pretty much this season’s must-have production technique, but here is a big, pounding anthem which has been buried under a blanket in the next room.  Or, to put it differently, it sounds like it was written for people on acid but recorded for people on heroin.

24. Glass Animals – Leaflings This song has been put together really carefully and, in my opinion, utterly brilliantly.  The bursts of muffled dancefloor beat which emerge at intervals from the muddy background is the only instance in recorded history of me even being able to tolerate that particular sound, never mind absolutely loving it.

25. Admiral Radley – I’m All Fucked on Beer This song needs no more explanation than the title.  It’s loud and rude and fucking brilliant. Punch the air, bang yer heids and open another can of Special.  And the wee two-second carnival interlude is pure genius.

26. Sweet Baboo – Y’r Lungs In a similar vein to I’m a Dancer, this song isn’t as sweet on the inside as it is on the outside.  But in this case the lyrics are at least sufficiently cryptic that the beautifully wistful sense of sadness which pervades the music is the impression which dominates the song.

27. Broken Records – Modern Worksong I said in my review that there was a palpable sense of well-disciplined purpose to this album, and nowhere is this more evident than in this song.  Forced forwards by that skittering beat, this track has such drive it’s fantastic.

28. Silver Columns – A Warm Welcome Like Kid Canaveral and Broken Records before them, Silver Columns are learning the immensely irritating lesson that no matter how upbeat and exciting your album, I will absolutely, definitely, always pick the one downbeat number as my favourite song on it.  Sorry lads, it’s not you, it’s me.

29. The Scottish Enlightenment – All Homemade Things The Scottish Enlightenment have been relentlessly productive this year, perhaps making up for all the lost time since their last single.  The only danger with their album being so well-received is that it seems to make people forget how good their two 2010 EPs were.  This is such a simple, simple song too, but that one riff and the customarily unhurried pace are judged just about perfectly.

30. Perfume Genius – Learning A bit like with The National, choosing songs from Learning to include on this list was a little bit arbitrary, as there’s barely a weak song on the album.

Click here to download all these songs in one zip file.

1-10 | 11-30 | 31-50

16. Cotton Jones – Tall Hours in the Glowstream

This album may peter out slightly, but there is something I find utterly compelling about the first two thirds of it.  The sound has a wonderfully naive and pretty core, with a shimmering, enigmatic veneer and for some reason this has consistently fascinated me since I first heard it.  In many ways it’s just a lovely, dreamy pop album, but the way it’s been put together is bloody ace.

Cotton Jones – Sail of the Silver Morning

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17. Sparrow & the Workshop – Crystals Fall

This is a little over-long perhaps, but a fierce, ballsy album which sometimes channels the bone and guts of malevolent folk tales, whilst at others the emotional heart of it comes from somewhere altogether more personal.  Excuse the term, but Jill O’Sullivan and her gentleman friends (now there’s a band name!) write music with more balls than most bands I’ve heard in ages.  Figurative balls, Jill, sorry, you know what I mean.

Sparrow & the Workshop – A Horse’s Grin

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18. Sweet Baboo – I’m a Dancer/Songs About Sleeping

There is an unsettling combination of wonderfully comforting, lovely music and rather darker lyrics at work here.  The songs seem to portray the manic microscope of a paranoid, slightly twisted over-thinker, but it’s all delivered in such gorgeous acoustic pop that it takes a moment or two for it to sink in.  This is the sort of album which tends to generate an awful lot of ‘hang on, what did he say?’ moments, particularly if you are (foolishly) only half paying attention.

Sweet Baboo – Y’r Lungs

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19. 30 Pounds of Bone – Method

It’s a very rough album this, and yet a very warm one at the same time.  The actual recorded sound is extremely immediate and very raw, and the lyrics could be pretty well described that way as well.  It all gives the impression of an album so close to the bone that you may at times find yourself looking away, but there is such an unvarnished quality to the whole presentation that listening to it ends up feeling like something of a privilege.

30 Pounds of Bone – Ghosts in the Grass

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20. Erland & the Carnival – Erland & the Carnival

This is a bit of an ex-Britpop supergroup (well, not really, but justaboutkindasorta) who seemingly tired of fey, sensitive ukuleles in alt-folk music and set about making an album which, whilst it does fit in that genre, sets about its business with a good deal more pace and purpose than many others it might share a display with in your local Fopp.  It may not be breaking any new ground at all, but there isn’t a weak moment on this album.

Erland & the Carnival – You Don’t Have to be Lonely

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This is as gorgeous an album of acoustic pop as you are likely to hear.  It’s all just done with such unassuming warmth it’s almost impossible not to be taken by it pretty much immediately.

Unlike a lot of modern folk pop there’s not a shred of affectation about this, and it doesn’t seem like it’s been aimed at any particular style either, it simply is what it is.  It’s as if the songs are the way they are for no more complicated a reason than that they just tumbled out that way.

Although in a sense, I suppose, that’s doing the album a disservice by implying, however tangentially, that it is in some way thoughtless or uncrafted, which is not what I am trying to suggest.  There is plenty of oomph to the arrangements when required, it’s just that it isn’t called upon that often.

I know I think of this almost as a debut album, owing to having only just discovered Sweet Baboo (courtesy of Cloud Sounds and Away Game), but Stephen is actually three albums (I think) into his career, so perhaps it should be no surprise that there is a confident solidity to this record.  Generally sad and beautiful, with little more than a gentle strum of guitar and vocals which seem to crack at times, and at others to be resigned and reassuring, it does burst out into skiffley pop tunes from time to time, demonstrating a pretty effortless charisma which many more lauded artists would struggle to match.

That jollity which appears from time to time is discomfitingly at odds with the rather unpleasant lyrics of songs like I’m a Dancer, and indeed even on the flip side of the emotional coin, the slower songs which sound so comforting can have downright morbid lyrics, such as the final song, If I Died, Would You Remember That You Loved Me.  So apart from the lovely musical creations, there’s an emotional complexity and an inclination to wrong-foot the listener at work here which make this record a genuine cut above most things I’ve heard this year.

Sweet Baboo – I’m a Dancer (1)

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Sweet Baboo – If I Died Would You Remember That You Loved Me

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Website | More mp3s | Buy from Shape Records

This is er… well, “one of those podcasts”. You know, the ones where you’re half pissed before lunch and basically mumble your way through an hour or so of incoherent rambling? Yes, one of those.

I even try and do something of a Cloud Sounds tribute by playing two songs available on 7″ single from Cloud Sounds Records and then by playing two songs from bands I got into by listening to Cloud Sounds’ podcast but unfortunately the fact that I am joined in this podcast by Andy and Paddy from Gerry Loves Records means that more or less any attempt to keep things on-topic, or indeed to have a topic at all, are pretty much doomed.

It’s been a while since I did a proper train wreck podcast so all I can really do it apologise in advance and urge you to sit back and enjoy it!

Direct download: Toadcast #147 – The Rowiecast

01. The Generalissimos – The Men Behind the Man (00.03)
02. Onions – I Want to be a Dancer (06.07)
03. Sufjan Stevens – Vesuvius (12.36)
04. Tidy Kid – Smell (Bibio Remix) (23.32)
05. Roy Robertson – Icing (27.34)
06. Pregnant – Wiff of Father (35.09)
07. Sweet Baboo – I’m a Dancer Pt. 2 (46.48)
08. The Maladies of Bellafontaine – Black Biro (50.31)
09. James Yorkston – Lovely to be Here (Excerpt) (60.19)
10. Ringo Deathstarr – Imagine Hearts (69.43)

Fresh Air, after giving its hard-working students an entirely deserved and not at all excessive four months off over the Summer, is back on the interweb airwaves this week.  And you know what that means, don’t you?  Yes, Ruth calling me names for an hour and a half while we play songs!  Hooray!  Kind of.

We’ve been off the air for ages, and I actually haven’t seen Ruth all that much in the intervening time, so it will be nice to have a chat and catch up, although I promise to try and do most of that whilst the songs are playing so as not to bore you too much.

Live from 8pm (UK time) – listen here.

The player on the page linked to above can be a little flaky, so just pause and un-pause it and that should sort it out.  Alternatively I am pretty certain you can find us on iTunes quite easily.  We’ll be updating the playlist live below as we go along, so feel free to chip in with comments during the show and we’ll… well, probably just tell you to piss off, really.

1. Meursault – Crank Resolutions
2. Jackson C. Frank – Blues Run the Game
3. Sweet Baboo – I’m a Dancer
4. Onions – I Want to be a Dancer
5. The Decemberists – Down by the Water
6. The National – Terrible Love (New Version)
7. The Driftwood Singers – Coco Ellis
8. Oz St. Fossils – The Jeweller’s Daughter
9. Trips and Falls – I Learned Sunday Morning, on a Wednesday
10. REM – I Believe
11. Ray’s Vast Basement – The Story of Lee
12. Pet Shop Boys – What Have I Done to Deserve This?
13. Sparta Philharmonic – Devotion
14. Nick Drake – Blues Run the Game

I just don’t understand it.  I mean, I come back from the most amazing musical weekend I think I have ever enjoyed, and instead of being interested and happy for me, when I start telling people about it they get this weird look in their eyes which looks just a little like blind homicidal rage.  Even more unusually, this look only seems to really go away when I shush and complain about the bad weather in Edinburgh this time of year.  (The weather on Eigg, by the way, was awwwwwesome!)

Anyhow, this is the epitome, in its own quiet way, of the dilemma faced by much of the music industry at the moment.  Do you make things smaller and more exclusive, and risk cutting off people who genuinely want to support you and be a part of what you are doing, or do you allow things to grow to the extent where they become unwieldy, lose their magic and you cease to actually find them rewarding yourself? Read the rest of this entry »