Corporate Rock Sucks: The Rise and Fall of SST Records by Jim Ruland

 I spent a lot of time as a teenager listening to music released on the SST label.  Black Flag, Minutemen, Husker Du, Descendents, Bad Brains and many more released music via SST in the halcyon days of the 1980s.  Then it all went wrong.  The good bands stopped releasing music or moved to another label and eventually SST ground to a halt.

This book highlights how successful SST actually were at their peak and documents the fall.  It's not totally clear what precipitated the fall but the departure of key team members such as Chuck Dukowski and Mugger seems to have played a part.  Greg Ginn is often cast as a pantomime villain in events although I'm  not sure how accurate this is.  Certainly, early on, he did a lot of good for these bands and gave them a step up to better things.

I was an American hardcore/alternative enthusiast when I was younger but this book contained viewpoints I was unfamiliar with and has introduced some music that I did not know.  I was left pining for a world where SST signed Nirvana and managed to keep Sonic Youth happy/release Daydream Nation.  That may have been an exciting world.

What does the future for the SST bands hold?  Will we see reissues and remasters with unreleased material?  Has it all been lost?  Do they even have decent tapes of the 1982 Black Flag demoes. 

Ian MacKaye took a very different, archivist approach with Dischord and we will have much of the DC scene for posterity.  The LA scene may just be degenerating, covered in some green mould.

Beastie Boys Book

I've been digesting the Beastie Boys Book for the last month or so.  It's amazing, disjointed and brilliant just like the band.  I've been listening to the audiobook due to my lack of free reading time.  It's one of the best audiobooks I've ever encountered.  They have invited a stellar cast of narrators including Snoop Doggy Dogg, Kim Gordon, Chuck D, Will Ferrell, Bette Midler and Steve Buscemi as well as many many others.

The narrative jumps about from their childhood, through early punk adventures, Bad Brains and Black Flag concerts, New York Discos, career low-points (Def Jam), clothing labels, recording with Lee Scratch Perry and lists of equipment, recipes and mix tapes.  Everything is in this book.

Much of the book is a tribute to Adam Yauch, MCA, who died in 2012 from parotid cancer.  His fellow Beastie Boys clearly and understandably miss him.  In some ways he appears to have been a pathfinder for the band and is credited as being the Beastie who made things happen.

The physical release is beautifully illustrated with photos and comics strips reminiscent of the old Grand Royale magazine from the 90s.  It's a thing of beauty but the audiobook is worth your time too.

A fitting legacy for a great band.  Sadly, I never saw them and I deeply regret it.  I am glad I had their music (and their music videos).

Finding Joseph I: The HR From Bad Brains Documentary

The Bad Brains were co-headlining the second proper gig I saw, playing with Fishbone at the Glasgow Barrowlands in 1993.  Sadly H.R. was not with them that night with vocals from Israel Joseph instead.  It was still mind-blowing but I would have loved to see them with H.R. at their peak.

Bad Brains made amazing music but they were troubled at times.  H.R. was an amazing frontman but, as this film makes clear, he had problems.  His story is told by his brother, friends, bandmates, colleagues and fans. Humorous anecdotes eventually become sadder and the reality of the situation becomes clear.  At times H.R. (or Joseph as he is sometimes called) is homeless and making bad decisions.  He hears voices.  Onstage he can be seen visibly hallucinating and interacting with voices.  Eventually his wife manages to get him proper medical attention and anti-psychotic medications.  He gets better after that.

I learned stuff about HR that I didn't know through this film.  I heard some of his non-Bad Brains music (although I've had a few of his post-Bad Brains SST solo records for decades).  It compiles some great live footage.

Enlightening and sad, it ends on a positive note.

Danzig - 30 years - Live at the Glasgow Barrowlands

Danzig wrote some of the first punk music I heard.  As an 11 or 12 year old primary school kid in the late '80s I heard the metallica version of last caress and I loved it.  I didn't understand the words but I loved the tune.  A year or so later I got a tape with Bullet on it and again I loved it. I then obtained a copy of the misfits album (collection 1) and heard some of their other stuff (earth ad/the album with rollins singing we are 138).

I became aware of samhain and Danzig (the band).  Danzig were actively making music and thankfully, due to a lack of MTV, I never saw the videos.  I only heard the tunes on the first couple of albums and again I loved it.

Danzig stopped writing good music in 1995 when he went industrial but the first 4 albums were good.  I essentially gave up on his new music at that point.  There may be some good stuff in there but I haven't heard it.  Glenn Danzig is probably the last of the classic punk singers that I hadn't seen live (apart from HR who wasn't with the Bad Brains when I saw them).  I couldn't wait to see him live.

It was what I expected.  The live mix wasn't great with the vocals a bit too quiet but for a 63 year old man Danzig still has some moves.  He ran about the stage and interacted with the crowd.  He had a rant about how he was actually singing and how the band were really playing.  He played some hits.

The band came on at about 9:40 PM and we got the set that has been punted around Europe a lot recently.  Sadly he only did a two song encore suggesting that he wasn't too into it himself.  The set included Twist of Cain, Not of this world, Am I Demon, Tired of being alive and Mother as well as She Rides in the encore.

I don't think he'll play Scotland again but I'm glad I saw him.  Childhood dream fulfilled.  Just a shame there wasn't a decent sound engineer

sometimes it's nice to meet your heroes - End of an Era 2, the final ATP holiday camp festival and Mike Watt

The ATP festival concept was brilliant but sadly it has now run it's course.  This weekend I attended the ATP chalet festival at Camber Sands in Rye.  For work and financial reasons I never made it to the early festivals but I always looked at the line-ups with awe.  A good friend of mine plays in Mogwai and actually curated the first ATP festival but the first one I made it to was curated by Jeff Mangum in 2012.  I loved that experience and went back to the Deerhunter event this summer.

I was sad to hear that the festivals were ending.  I am not privy to the reasons for this but running a big festival has to be difficult in harsh financial climates.  Pontins certainly did not roll out the red carpet for guests this time, requiring us to bring our own linen.

The line-up for this festival was brilliant and contained many personal favourites. Slint, Shellac, Loop, Girls Against Boys, Michael Rother, Mike Watt and of course Mogwai.  Attendance was required despite my fears about the notoriously unpredictable late November weather.  In the end I made it to Camber Sands without any snow having made a stop at the British Museum on the way.

Pontins is not scenic and reminds me of my home town of East Kilbride.  I guess it provides an appropriate back drop for alternative rock but I wouldn't want to spend an actual holiday here.

On the first night I saw Thought Forms, a band I was unfamiliar with.  They made some cool Sonic Youth-y noises and jumped about.  I liked what I heard so I bought up their back catalogue.  I'll look out for them in the future.

Thought Forms

After Thought Forms I caught Om and the Fuck Buttons set.  Om were intense with a great Sabbath/stoner rock sound.  I have a few records by Sleep, the band that Om developed from and they were just as good.  After that the Fuck Buttons hit the stage.  They made some great noises.  I don't have any of their records but I enjoyed seeing them.  Finishing off Friday night was a one-two whammy of Shellac and Slint. 

I saw Shellac in Glasgow last weekend and this was the 5th time that I have seen them since 1994.  I bought the first Shellac singles as they came out back in 1993 and they have always been one of my favourite bands.  They played a great set although they were oddly quiet (dodgy PA).  They even played 'wingwalker'.

Shellac wearing their evening suits

Slint too had a quiet PA but it was great to see them again.  They played most of Spiderland as well as a track from Tweez and a track from their EP.  I had hoped that we might have seen more of the mythical Slint documentary film but there was no joy.  After the concert I ended up in the Mogwai party chalet and in a drunken haze I met David Pajo.  He seems like a nice guy, even when confronted with an intoxicated Scottish Danzig fan.

The next morning was a bit of a red wine haze.  I woke up early and went to Camber Sands beach to contemplate infinity.  Camber is probably fairly nice in the summer but it's a really small town.  I wouldn't want to live there.  The locals were nice but the holiday camp is certainly grim.  This time we brought food with us so we didn't have to buy overpriced rubbish in the Nisa store or toxic waste from the onsite food outlets.

The beach itself is beautiful.  I took a few photos before my hangover really kicked in.  I was able to watch the Dismemberment Plan play a set that drew heavily from 'emergency & I' but after that I had to lie down for a bit to prepare myself for the evenings festivities.  After my much needed beauty sleep I caught a bit of 23 Skidoo and the Pop Group.  Neither band really set my world on fire but it was nice to see 'we are all prostitutes' played live.

Comets on Fire were a different thing altogether.  They took to the smaller downstairs stage and tore the place apart.  I've been listening to a couple of their albums which are enjoyable enough.  The recordings did not prepare me for the rock fury of the band on stage.  Blending Mudhoney, the Stooges and Sabbath they sent an electric shock through the crowd.  Rocktastic.

Comets on Fire

I had been listening to Loop stuff in an attempt to prepare myself for this concert.  I sort of missed Loop as a teenager spending more time listening to Spacemen 3.  In recent months I have taken a bit of a crash course in their stuff but it didn't really click until I saw them live.  They managed to make an immense noise with the hitherto 'polite' upstairs PA system.  Their repetitive drones drove the crowd mad and a plague of crowd surfing spread though the room.  To ice the cake they encored with 'mother sky' by Can.  I was grinning from ear to ear.  Once more I retired to the Mogwai party chalet where I had a close encounter with some rather nice 15 year old Glenlivet.  I stumbled back to my chalet at around 3am with a smile on my face.

My hangover was a bit worse on Sunday.  I managed to reconstitute myself in time for the Michael Rother set at 3:30pm.  It was pretty good but I preferred the Neu heavy set that I caught in Primavera a few years before.  My recovery was complete in time for the Mike Watt set.  He was playing ll Sogno Del Marinaio, a sort of opera about sailors.  It was nice, instrumental passages with intermittent vocal flourishes. He finished his set with a cover of Funhouse by the Stooges (i think).  Watt is a great hero of mine but I'll return to this topic in due course.

Mike Watt

After Watt came Girls Against Boys.  I've been listening to Girls against Boys for many, many years. I saw them 2 or 3 times in the mid nineties but I haven't seen them for a long long time.  I was rather excited to see them again and I wasn't disappointed.  The sound was slightly ropey during the first song but they managed to shine anyway.  They kicked off with 'tucked in' before playing an action packed set.  The strength of the Girls Against Boys back catalogue was highlighted by the fact that they managed to play a great show despite missing out classics like 'I don't got a place' and 'sexy sam'.  The new songs that they played held their own against the old material.  It's a shame that GVSB never had the success they deserved.

Girls Against Boys

The next big discovery of the weekend was Goat.  Goat are a Swedish band that wear masks and play intoxicating rhythms.  They make you want to dance.  I suspect them to be the Knife in disguise but I am told that this is not the case.

Goat going bongo crazy

Finally the last ever ATP festival was closed by one of the best bands on earth. Mogwai.  I cannot write an objective word about mogwai, especially when they got me drunk all weekend and gave me a stage access pass for their set.  However, I will honestly say that they played a brilliant set.  The new material is amazing (especially 'remurdered' and 'blues hour').  I remember first hearing them play Helicon 1 about 18 years ago in a very small room and seeing them playing it again in a very big room in front of some very excited fans was great.  Mogwai curated the first ATP festival and it was fitting that they closed the last one.

Mogwai playing mexican grand prix

After they finished the DJ played 'Teenage Riot' by Sonic Youth and it was all over.  The crowd went mad.  I was able to nip on stage and take some photos of the departing crowd.  Somehow I had found the 'make everything look drunk' button on my camera.  I ended up in the surprise party for Barry Hogan at 2:30am.  I shouldn't really have been there (although I was again abducted by the 'gwai) but it was nice to hear his words on a series of events that have meant a lot to people with good taste.  I don't know what he'll do next but I'm sure it'll be good.

As a coda to an amazing festival I had an amazing experience on the train from Rye to Ashford.  I met Mike Watt on the platform and I spent about 30 minutes talking to him.  SST punk was a big thing for me and I remember first hearing the Minutemen after buying the Post-Mersh volume 3 CD from Tower Records one boxing day (maybe 1991?).  Watt is one of the nicest men alive and when he heard my accent he asked me if I knew Dep from Monorail Records.  When I told him that Dep had advised me on Minutemen records over the years he smiled.  I think he regards Dep as a sort of missionary.

Watt spoke about his need to constantly tour.  He sees life on the road as being like that of a sailor, like his father who was in the navy and served in Vietnam.  Watt told me that he saw little of his father growing up and that he feels he only got to know him in his thirties by which point he was dying of cancer.  Watt himself said that he had decided not to have children as he felt family life was incompatible with life on the road.

He suffers from arthritis and needs to have a knee operation next year.  He'll need to to take 6 months off from touring to do that.  He says that this will be difficult as he doesn't know what to do when he isn't touring.

He told me a bit about how he recorded some of his records, how they got free studio time to record one song but managed to record all of the first side of 'buzz or howl under the influence of heat' by pretending it was one song.  He told me that he originally wanted to use images from the magazine Scientific American for the cover (indeed the title came from Scientific American) but the photo cost too much so Joe Baiza drew a sketch of him and D Boon instead.

Watt is an inspirational musician and his life and words have meant a lot to me over the years.  After I finished talking to him, changing trains at Ashford International I listened to all 175 minutemen tracks on my iPod back to back.  They took me most of the way back to Glasgow.  I thought about the life of Mike Watt and how he has given so much to me.  I don't think he's a rich man but he is a good man.  Like most American musicians he won't have free health care and nobody buys records now so musicians have to tour to make money.  If anyone reads this think about buying a mike watt record (fIREHOSE/minutemen/anything) or go to a mike watt gig.  He's a good bloke.

With the ATP concept, Barry Hogan did a good thing and has given me some amazing experiences.  I hope he does something new, similar and brilliant again.  Maybe even in Scotland?

The Argument by Grant Hart

I've written about Grant Hart before on this blog.  I regard him as a great lost talent, a wayward genius, who should have been rich and famous but life got in the way.  Husker Du were a great band and Hart wrote many of their best songs.

The Argument is a concept album based on William S Burroughs unpublished treatment of Milton's Paradise Lost.  The music is as creative and insane as that sounds. The album is about satan and his war with God set to music that mixes alternative rock with songs reminiscent of the comedy tracks on Beatles albums. It's mad but fun.

I've listened to this CD a few times now and I'm liking it.  As I've written before, I think Hart has been unlucky in life and I don't think he's a rich man. Buy this CD or pay for a download. It's worth hearing.

The Death of the Record Shop

Society has changed.  People have changed.  A lot of the stuff that I loved as a kid has gone.  Sadly, record shops are dying out.

HMV, a mighty giant, has been fatally wounded.  HMV used to be dominant in the field.  It was the alpha-shop.  It wiped out all opposition.  HMV was the same everywhere; East Kilbride, Argyle Street, Coventry, Birmingham, Leicester.  The HMV brand was everywhere.  In the early '90s it was modern and cool (in a corporate way).  The good stuff was often overpriced but they punted a lot of landfill CDs in their sales.  I spent a lot of money there.

Over the past 5 years or so HMV hadn't been looking so good.  They had lost their way.  They wanted to sell iPods and stereo systems.  They had less music (or at least they seemed to have less).  I would walk into HMV and realise I didn't have a reason to be there.  I could buy my disposible media from Amazon and I didn't need to wander around HMV to do it.  If I wanted anything cool I could go to Monorail or Fopp (although Fopp has been an indie stalking horse for HMV for years now).

When I  was a teenager I loved trudging about record shops to buy  second  hand Husker Du  lps and Butthole Surfers tapes.  I would bump into people I know.  It gave you something to do.  Life goes on and now I have plenty to do but I feel that teenagers of the  future will miss out on something.  I guess elderly trainspotters feel that the teenagers today are missing out on the steam trains of the '40s and '50s.

HMV is fucked.  I will try and spend some money in Monorail this month.  I bought some stuff in Fopp last month.  I'm probably pissing in the wind.

My weekend at the ATP festival or why Scott Spillane is the nicest guy ever

I’ve been wanting to go to an ATP music festival for a long time.  The festival grew out of the Bowlie Weekender organised by Belle & Sebastian at the Camber Sands holiday camp and was rebooted as the All Tomorrow’s Parties (ATP) festival curated in its first year by Mogwai.  Cool bands would ask more cool bands to play.  The line-up is often a wet dream for music nerds like myself.

Sadly, circumstances have prevented me attending before now.  This has been due to limited finance and, limited holiday entitlement.  Thankfully, times have changed, I’ve paid off some debts and I get more freedom with my holidays that I did in the past.  When I saw that ATP was to be curated by Jeff Mangum of Neutral Milk Hotel in December I picked up tickets as soon as I could.  

It wasn’t straightforward from there.  The festival had to be rescheduled for undisclosed reasons shortly before the initial date in December.  This change of dates was a two edged sword.  March is a better time for travel than December but two of my friends could not make the new date.  This triggered some frantic searching for other people to use the tickets.  I didn’t really want to sell the tickets to strangers and the market value of the tickets dropped.  Fortunately two friends stepped into the breach bringing their 2 year old son with them.

Despite these logistical difficulties I was still very excited about the event.  I counted about 20 bands on the bill that I wanted to see.  Below is a list of the bands I managed to see.

The Elephant 6 holiday surprise band

Jeff Mangum (twice)

Mike Watt and George Hurley playing the songs of the Minutemen

Thurston Moore

Jon Spencer Blues Explosion

The Fall

Robin Hitchcock

A hawk and a hacksaw

The Boredoms (twice)

Low

Yann Tierson

The Magnetic Fields

Earth

The Raincoats

Olivia Tremor Control

The American Contemporary Music Ensemble (ACME)

The Apples in Stereo

The Magic Band

The Sun-Ra Arkestra

Scratch Acid

Sebadoh

Secret Surprise closing set featuring Sun-Ra arkestra, Olivia Tremor Control, The Elephant 6 holiday Surprise band, the Boredoms and friends.

Overall, this represents a very good weekend.  I saw a lot of bands I never thought I would see, I made some new friends and I had a lot of fun.  I will now labour this point in detail.

The Elephant 6 Holiday Surprise Band opened the festival on the Friday afternoon.  The Holiday Surprise band is basically a pick-up/jam band composed of available members of Elephant 6 bands.  They play covers and songs from their individual bands.  At times they had more than 10 people on stage.  They play an impressive array of instruments including the saw and some form of horn that fits around a large man.  They played songs by bands like the Gerbils and Elf Power during a set which culminated in a cover of a Sun-Ra track called ‘enlightenment’.  They got the crowd singing along with this track before walking into the crowd while playing their instruments.  They then left the concert hall and walked about the pavilion at Butlins as the song continued.  This was a great thing to see.

After this set I bought some t-shirts and ate some food.  I then got myself into position to see the first Jeff Mangum set of the weekend.  For many reasons I never thought that I would see Jeff Mangum play live.  He has kept a very low profile for the best part of 15 years and it hasn’t really been possible to imagine that he would return to live work.  I have been aware of Neutral Milk Hotel since my friends were blown away by them at a Glasgow show supporting Sparklehorse in the late ‘90s.  I had a couple of Olivia Tremor Control records but I only picked up ‘in the aeroplane over the sea’ when it was reissued by Domino in 2005.  Since then it has been one of my favourite records.  I love it.

Seeing these songs played live was something special.  For the most part Mangum played acoustic guitar unaccompanied but at key moments he was joined by other Julian Koster on the saw or Scott Spillane blowing a horn.  Like many of the bands on this bill the sound is capable of raising goosebumps.  I was singing along to songs like Holland, 1945, The King of Carrot Flowers and two-headed boy.  My singing made me happy although I’m sure others would disagree.

After the end of the Jeff Mangum set I watched part of the Raincoats set.  I saw the Raincoats at the Phoenix festival in 1994 although I’ve only picked up their records in the past couple of years.  I managed to see 5 songs including their classic version of ‘lola’.  I then ran through to see the Fall who delivered an aggressive set of classic Mark E Smith.  This was the 3^rd time I’ve seen the Fall and they’ve been good every time. 

After the Fall I watched the solo set by Thurston Moore despite drunken interjections from my friends who don’t like Sonic Youth as much as I do.  The set drew mainly from the 1995 Psychic Hearts album.  At present, this is the closest I’ll get to seeing Sonic Youth for a year or two.

The next set that I saw was probably the musical highlight of my weekend.  I saw Mike Watt and George Hurley play a set of Minutemen songs.  For the uninitiated, the Minutemen were an early ‘80s SST punk band whose career was cut short by the death of singer/guitarist D. Boon in a car crash.  The Minutemen were more expansive than most punk bands.  Musically they were self taught and they played with an almost psychic degree of precision.  They sounded like nothing that came before them.  Their songs had intelligent political lyrics and off-beat humour.  D. Boon and Mike Watt seemed to have their own private language.  Watt and Hurley will play Minutemen songs as a duo but they would never use another guitarist on these songs.

I started to listen the Minutemen on boxing day 1991 when I bought their post-mersh volume 3 singles compliation CD from Tower Records in Glasgow.  As soon as I heard ‘if regan played disco’ that they were nearly perfect.  I susbsequently bought up their entire back catalogue and spent several years trying to play guitar like D Boon.  I failed. 

Walking into a room and hearing the music of the minutemen is an amazing experience.   Seeing Mike Watt play bass is an amazing experience.  These songs are fast, complicated and tight.  Watt would play all the bass parts and sing the songs.  At points where we expected a D Boon guitar break he would pause and look at the other side of the stage.  It was really poignant.  At a guess I would say that more than 30 songs were played with few pauses of breath.  Many of my favourites were there but I could have watched them for 2 hours.  At the end of the set Watt thanked the crowd and suggested that we should start out own bands.  I’m too old for that sort of thing but the experience was spiritual.  I hope I get to see this again.

After that I watched the end of the Blues Explosion set before heading home to catch some sleep before day 2.

We started the second day watching A Hawk and A Hacksaw.  They were playing a soundtrack to some old Eastern European film.  The music was very relaxing, perfect for a hangover.  After that I went over to the main hall to catch the first Boredoms set of the weekend.  I was blown away by the Boredoms when I saw them in Glasgow a few years back and the experience was similar here.  The main dude, Eye, stood in a circle of 5 drummers, conducting them while 15 guitarists added further colour to the sound.  The Boredoms had also bought their strange percurive guitar machine which is always fun.  I urge anyone who likes interesting music to see the Boredoms if they can.

Later on that evening I watched Low who delivered the goods as they usually do.  They were followed by Yann Tierson who was a new name to me.  His electronic music made me think of Blade Runner and Air.  I popped out to see a couple of songs by Earth but I was unimpressed so I returned to see the end of the Yann Tierson set.

Scratch Acid were another band I thought I would never see.  I have a certain fondness for the Jesus Lizard, the band that Scratch Acid evolved into.  Scratch Acid are a good, aggressive, noise rock band and David Yow is a great frontman but they lack the razor-like guitar of the Jesus Lizard.  It was great seeing them but the Jesus Lizard are probably better.

On the Sunday morning I started the day by watching ACME – the American Contemporary Music Ensemble.  They are an instrumental group who played a few chilled out pieces.  They were helped on one song by Julian Koster of Elephant 6 fame.

After that we went for a bit of a wander and we met Scott Spillane, a member of both Neutral Milk Hotel and the Gerbils.  He is a really nice bloke.  I always feel like I’m bothering someone famous if I go up and start talking to them but Spillane was very genial.  We talked a bit about the dire state of American politics, health care in the US and the UK, what he thought various Neutral Milk Hotel Songs were about (he doesn’t know) and the possibility of new Jeff Mangum material.  He told me that Jeff has written some new songs that he might record and that there are still plenty of old songs yet to be recorded.  He thinks that Jeff sometimes doesn’t want to record because that means a song is ‘finished’ but he thinks we’ll hear something at some point.  Really nice bloke.

After that we went to the cinema to see 20 minutes of footage from a Slint documentary by director Lance Bangs.  The finished film should be out by the end of the year.  I’m really looking forward to it.  In the footage we learn that the Jesus Lizard song ‘Mouthbreather’ is based on a comment Steve Albini made about Britt from Slint after he trashed Albini’s house – ‘don’t get me wrong, he’s a nice guy, I like him just fine but he’s a mouthbreather.’ 

After this I saw the Boredoms again, followed by the Magic Band and Olivia Tremor Control.  Olivia Tremor Control were interesting to see but their set was hampered by slightly ropey sound.  I then watched the Sun Ra Arkestra before we all had to queue up to see the second Jeff Mangum set of the weekend.   The songs were slightly different from Friday with a cover of ‘true love will find you in the end’ by Daniel Johnston and the little known Neutral Milk Hotel song ‘little birds’ from the recent box set.  Very, very good.

Sebadoh closed the main festival with an energetic set.  I like Sebadoh so it was good to see them.  However the highlight of the evening was probably a secret show that wasn’t advertised after Sebadoh finished.   A friendly member of the OTC roadcrew told us that Sun Ra, the Elephant 6 Holiday Surprise Band, the Boredoms and the Olivia Tremor Control would be having a jam in the Reds venue at the end of the night.  We ran down after Sebadoh finished and we were not disappointed.  At least 30 musicians filled the stage to play the Sun Ra song ‘enlightenment’ bringing a musical symmetry to the event.  Beautiful.

ATP is probably the best festival ever.

Grant Hart - live at Mono, Glasgow

I went to see Grant Hart at Mono last night.  I've been listening to Husker Du since I was about 12 and 'never talking to you again' is one of my favourite songs ever.  I loved seeing him play but it was heartbreaking to watch.  He does not look very well.

I'm not sure who the support act was.  He sounded like a one-man-band playing the Ramones.  It was OK but I don't think I'd rush to hear him again.

Grant came on and he looked terrible.  Even from 20 metres away I could see that he is jaundiced.  He looked worse later on when I bought a single from him after the show.  His teeth are a mess.  As a doctor this was sad to see.  I've worked in a few Glasgow hospitals and I've seen a lot of people in liver failure and you don't want to see a musical hero like this.  I don't know if it's viral hepatitis from when he was injecting drugs or if it's booze or if it's cancer but Grant Hart looks like a very sick man.  As a musician in America I don't think he has a health care plan and I strongly suspect he isn't getting much in the way of Husker Du royalties.  Poor bloke.

The sound in Mono was not great but Hart shone despite the sonic problems.  His voice continues to be great and he ran through his back catalogue playing requests as people shouted them out.  He played his songs from Husker Du including She floated away, Books about UFOs, Pink Turns to Blue and Sorry somehow.  He played my personal favourite never talking to you again as well as stand-out solo tracks like 2541 and Admiral of the sea  by Nova Mob.  He kept going for nearly 2 hours.  It was great to see.

I am worried about him.  He looks very sick and I hope he is getting decent medical attention.  I hope his health improves and he keeps going. 

See a Little Light: The Trail of Rage and Melody by Bob Mould and Michael Azerrad

This book is the autobiography of Bob Mould, singer/songwrighter and key member of Husker Du and Sugar.  I've been listening to his music since the age of 12 or 13.  He has created a solid body of passionate indie rock music.   Zen Arcade is one of the greatest punk albums ever and he has released several others that are nearly as good.

I think it is important to remember that you can like the music that a person creates without actually liking the person that much.  A classic example of this would be Pete Doherty of the Libertines who appears to be a repugnant human being despite having written one or two good songs.  Bob Mould has written a very open and honest autobiography and he does not always cast himself in a good light. 

Mould treats the former members of Husker Du with contempt although if his version of events is correct they certainly were not angels.  The description of Grant Hart trying to seduce the hetrosexual bass player from Sugar is fairly funny.  Mould also desribes how badly he dealt with the suicide of one of the administrative team for Husker Du.  He seems to have a tendency to walk away from difficult situations and end long term relationships abruptly and permanently.  At one point in the book he describes how he learned of the death of his former partner, a man he lived with for several years, on the internet eight years after the event.  I guess things like that happen but it is sad.

At times Mould seems to take strange turns in his life.  He spent almost a year working as a scriptwriter for a wrestling show that starred Hulk Hogan among others.  He also started abusing steroids during that period.  Mould was no stranger to substance misuse having abused alcohol from the age of 13 and amphetamines during the early years of Husker Du.  Despite this he managed to be unaware of the heroin abuse of Grant Hart despite sharing a room with him on tour for many years.

Towards the end of the book Mould appears to be more comfortable in his own skin as he comes to terms with his homosexuality and becomes more involved in gay culture.  He still plays the music of Husker Du and Sugar when he tours but he has moved on.  I  was lucky enough to see him play an acoustic show in Glasgow 5 years ago and I wouldn't mind seeing him with a live band.  I've made a mental note to check out some of his more recent music.

This book is an unflinching portrait of Bob Mould.  I don't think he wants us to like him but at least now we probably understand him a bit more.  I certainly learned a few things.

The decline of western civilisation - a film review

I had been wanting to see this film for years. I eventually obtained a copy from those nice people on ebay and I was well impressed. The decline of western civilisation is a documentary by Penelopee Spheeris who later made her fortune as the director of Waynes World. The documentary examines the Los Angeles hardcore punk subculture of the late '70s/early '80s including one of my adolescent favourite bands Black Flag.

The west coast hardcore scene of the time seems to have been a pretty unpleasant place. Everything I have read about the scene highlights its violence. The punks spent a lot of time kicking the shit out of each other. Some of the punks in the film seem to be un-nice people. Darby Crash, the doomed singer of the Germs, and his girlfriend come across as stupid or immature.

Darby was a Sid Vicious clone who died of a heroin overdose between the end of filming and the release of the documentary. His image is on the cover of the soundtrack CD. The live footage of the Germs in the film is terrible. Darby could not sing and he seemed to have problems walking at times. He would injure himself on stage and fight the crowd. It is not pleasant to watch.

Some of the music that the Germs made was great. Lexicon devil, Media Blitz and Communist Eyes are all hardcore classics and it is worth tracking down. Pat Smear, the guitarist, played in the terminal line up of Nirvana and female rock singer Belinda Carlisle was their original drummer (really).

Black Flag are a much more serious deal in the film. The live footage is tighter that a gnats chuff. This was pre-Rollins Black Flag when they were fast and deadly with Ron Reyes singing. They sound as good as they did on their early seven inches and they look fucking amazing. I was ready to start jumping around my bedroom. If I had this DVD at age 14 I would have injured myself.

The Flag appear to be intelligent in the interview segment. Gregg Ginn and Gary McDaniels (aka Chuck Dukowski) make sense. It is clear that these guys could read. History underlines this impression when you consider the subsequent success of SST and Black Flag.

X are the other outstanding band in the film. They seem intelligent and interesting. Their music is good. Nausea, from their Los Angeles album, plays during the opening credits and creates a suitable atmosphere of unease. I have now been on ebay to pick up some of their other CDs.

Circle Jerks and Fear both give good performances. Fear were very antagonistic towards their audience and nearly started a riot. The other bands in the film were shit although the footage from Slash magazine was interesting.

As I mentioned before, Spheeris went on to direct Waynes World but you should also track down The Decline of Western Civilisation part II - the metal years which has some comedy Ozzy Osbourne footage.

Bad Brains

You wait a month for a post then 2 come along on the same day.

Playing with youtube - found this

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vDZWdG9_7oU

It's a video by the Bad Brains the godlike rastafarian hardcore punk band from washington dc. They are so good that you will shit yourself. I saw them once. They were great.

Enough - listen and fall in love

funky

ps - sorry if you don't like punk