Stephen Jones - '0-1-800-Jesus' From 1985-2001
Erik Satie - 'Gymnopedies No. 1' From Piano Works
Smog - 'All Your Woman Things' From The Doctor Came At Dawn
Sparklehorse - 'Spiritditch' From Vivadixiesubmarinetransmissionplot
Bonnie 'Prince' Billy - 'I See A Darkness' From I See A Darkness
The Dirty Three - 'Lullabye For Christie' From Whatever You Love,
You Are
Spain - 'Ten Nights' From The Blue Moods Of Spain
Babybird - 'Copper Feel' From The Happiest Man Alive
Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds - 'Lucy' From The Good Son
Tom Waits - 'Big In Japan' From Mule Variations
The Cramps - 'Human Fly' From Off The Bone
The Fall - 'Dr. Bucks' Letters' From The Unutterable
Karl from Lark sez: "You could add anything by Cohen or Dylan for their influence
although musically not that direct
As for why, if you've heard us and heard these songs you'd know why.
from nonsensical rhyming dadist nonsense to heartfelt love songs
and now even including a couple of good time numbers, well for us
anyway."
Morrissey - Ringleader of the Tormentors
Morrissey - Ringleader of the Tormentors
Great title, but there always great titles aren't they? Problem is I think one of his previous titles would have been more apt, 'Stop Me If You Think You've Heard This One Before', or 'That Joke Isn't Funny Anymore' as this album sounds like I have heard it before, it sounds like more of his old music, again. Artists sound the way they sound and this is why we like them. However whilst I wasn't expecting this to sound like new wave jazz or heavy metal, my problem lies in just that - expectations.
With Morrissey we always expect so much. While our expectations were being dulled by his solo outputs, his last album 'you are the quarry' raised them again, back to those we had of his former group. And this may be the crux of the problem.
Our expectations are such of him that we need to be challenged by what we hear and not to simply have the same formula repackaged again. Whilst we have believed his hype we desperately need him not too. Maybe to achieve this he needs someone with as much investment and input in the songs as he has. As such Morrissey sounds like he needs a stronger song writing partner, someone to bully him and to shape him and not to just write songs that sound like Morrissey songs.If rifts or riffs can not be patched up with Johnny Marr, then maybe its time for someone new, someone to push things further once more, to bring the best out of him. Something that Tony Visconti seems to have not quite managed.
As such I can only suggest our own Riccardo Terranova, with Morrissey's new adopted homeland of Italy, this would help with the kudos as well as the song writing.
For now Morrissey is treading water, when he should be walking on it. Pity.
PB
Great title, but there always great titles aren't they? Problem is I think one of his previous titles would have been more apt, 'Stop Me If You Think You've Heard This One Before', or 'That Joke Isn't Funny Anymore' as this album sounds like I have heard it before, it sounds like more of his old music, again. Artists sound the way they sound and this is why we like them. However whilst I wasn't expecting this to sound like new wave jazz or heavy metal, my problem lies in just that - expectations.
With Morrissey we always expect so much. While our expectations were being dulled by his solo outputs, his last album 'you are the quarry' raised them again, back to those we had of his former group. And this may be the crux of the problem.
Our expectations are such of him that we need to be challenged by what we hear and not to simply have the same formula repackaged again. Whilst we have believed his hype we desperately need him not too. Maybe to achieve this he needs someone with as much investment and input in the songs as he has. As such Morrissey sounds like he needs a stronger song writing partner, someone to bully him and to shape him and not to just write songs that sound like Morrissey songs.If rifts or riffs can not be patched up with Johnny Marr, then maybe its time for someone new, someone to push things further once more, to bring the best out of him. Something that Tony Visconti seems to have not quite managed.
As such I can only suggest our own Riccardo Terranova, with Morrissey's new adopted homeland of Italy, this would help with the kudos as well as the song writing.
For now Morrissey is treading water, when he should be walking on it. Pity.
PB
The Toy Guns: Under The Influence
Sheena Is A Punk Rocker - The Ramones. Because every time I wanna
write a song I wanna write a song like this. Its just a perfect
simple punk pop song, with any amounts of great hooks.
Happiness Is A Warm Gun - The Beatles. I really like how this tune
is really 3 tunes stuck together - much like paranoid android. And
it works. It's something I aimed at with our song no bullets no guns.
Too Much Too Young - The Specials. Could have chosen most of their
stuff really. This song though was the one that made me wanna write
ska tunes. The rhythms are really infectious and made me wanna
shake.
Bodies - The Sex Pistols. I chose this for its venom. The lyrics are
canny shocking I reckon, but great. I really love the scream of the
chorus and I'm always looking to do sommit similar but I cannae slip
it in at the mo like.
Sabotage - The Beastie Boys. Great cross over song, hip hop n punk.
It shows you that you can meld styles to great effect.
I Get Around - The Beach Boys. Pure surf pop, great singing and
catchy as hell. All you need in a tune.
Can't Stand Losing You - The Police. Really like the lyrics and feel
of this song. I took it and re-worked a bit of the lyric theme for
our song transmission.
Dreaming Of You - The Coral. Its the bass line that gets me - like
the way they nicked it from you're the one that i want from grease.
So we nicked it for one of our tunes, going mobile.
London Calling - The Clash. Really good war cry of a tune. I can
relate to this a lot. Influenced some of me own lyrics. Also like
the spiky guitars
A Forest - The Cure. Just reckon it's great the way the bass drives
the tune.
Song For My (Sugar Spun Sister) - The Stone Roses. The Stone Roses were the first band I eva got into when I were a tot. So they're the reason I wanted to be in a band. This tune was me favourite back
then.
Jimmy Jimmy - The Undertones. All their tunes are so underrated.
People only know teenage kicks and while that's a great tune they
have so many more. Kinda similar to sheena is a punk rocker in the
way that its a perfect punk pop tune. Cham
write a song I wanna write a song like this. Its just a perfect
simple punk pop song, with any amounts of great hooks.
Happiness Is A Warm Gun - The Beatles. I really like how this tune
is really 3 tunes stuck together - much like paranoid android. And
it works. It's something I aimed at with our song no bullets no guns.
Too Much Too Young - The Specials. Could have chosen most of their
stuff really. This song though was the one that made me wanna write
ska tunes. The rhythms are really infectious and made me wanna
shake.
Bodies - The Sex Pistols. I chose this for its venom. The lyrics are
canny shocking I reckon, but great. I really love the scream of the
chorus and I'm always looking to do sommit similar but I cannae slip
it in at the mo like.
Sabotage - The Beastie Boys. Great cross over song, hip hop n punk.
It shows you that you can meld styles to great effect.
I Get Around - The Beach Boys. Pure surf pop, great singing and
catchy as hell. All you need in a tune.
Can't Stand Losing You - The Police. Really like the lyrics and feel
of this song. I took it and re-worked a bit of the lyric theme for
our song transmission.
Dreaming Of You - The Coral. Its the bass line that gets me - like
the way they nicked it from you're the one that i want from grease.
So we nicked it for one of our tunes, going mobile.
London Calling - The Clash. Really good war cry of a tune. I can
relate to this a lot. Influenced some of me own lyrics. Also like
the spiky guitars
A Forest - The Cure. Just reckon it's great the way the bass drives
the tune.
Song For My (Sugar Spun Sister) - The Stone Roses. The Stone Roses were the first band I eva got into when I were a tot. So they're the reason I wanted to be in a band. This tune was me favourite back
then.
Jimmy Jimmy - The Undertones. All their tunes are so underrated.
People only know teenage kicks and while that's a great tune they
have so many more. Kinda similar to sheena is a punk rocker in the
way that its a perfect punk pop tune. Cham
Ian Thorp Reports From Sunny Malaysia
I love Malaysia; it’s a great place.
For one it reminds me of home - England, not Australia, despite the fact that it’s in the tropics and the temperature hardly ever drops below 30 degrees - Why? It’s the subtle little things;
The power point are the same as in the UK -there’s something reassuring about the big plug with a fuse in it; they have double yellow lines here and Marks and Spencer, this seems odd bearing in mind that:
I have no plugs that actually fit into those sockets
Double yellow lines usually equal bad thing
M&S in KL doesn’t sell prawn and mayo sarnies and seems to be the most expensive shop in the city - Armani’s cheaper than M&S!
For another its clean, modern, people are really friendly and stuff just works.
K.L.’s a really strange mix of old colonial buildings, and super modern high tech stuff like the Petronas Tower that was one of the worlds tallest building until the Taiwanese chucked up this little number: http://www.emporis.com/en/wm/ci/bu/mf/?id=101320 which is 509M.
The Petronas certainly one of the worlds best looking buildings which was omni-present when ever I looked out of my hotel window as they nicely upgraded me to have a champion view from the 25th floor, however if I felt like I was in Lost in Translation in Singapore the feeling was doubly so in KL as I was there all alone.
Public transport makes London transport look positively third world, well I guess that’s because it is, there’s a mono-rail system, light rail and high speed train that get you the 80KM from the airport at the speed of light, it was 2004 when I got on the train the train it was 2516 and the world was run by apes, so I took the train back to the airport, got a taxi and all was back to normal when I got back to the city.
I didn’t get much time to have a look around as I was working, I got taken on a bit a off sight-seeing by one of the guys I work with, who took me too the Islamic museum, which was pretty interesting, especially all the big swords and stuff, I didn’t see one tourist in there which was pretty cool and visited the new political district - Putra Jaya - which looked like Milton Keynes only with a huge mosque in the middle of a roundabout and the most ornate lampposts you have ever seen - which I failed to take any photos of, so you will just have to take my word for it.
I was, believe it or not stuck in a massive hail storm the first day I was there, gale force winds and hail stones the size of golf balls (which I thought was a little excessive for hail until I discovered that storms that rip up trees and telegraph poles are rare occurrences and my colleague had never even seen - ever), the eyes of the locals turned to me- seemingly I give new meaning to the term weatherman! - Was it a coincidence that every day after that, evening prayer time just happened to be just before someone gave me a lift to the station?
Got a taxi to an Irish bar to meet a colleague who lives there and obviously done an excellent job of assimilating into the community - not! Finally get to the bar and it cost me a (relative) fortune in the taxi - and I can’t believe that he hadn’t picked a closer bar, “why its only 10 minutes drive away!”
-We’ll yes maybe however my driver was obviously proud of his town and wanted to show me around - he did this by completing a full lap of the ring road surrounding the city!! Taxi drivers - all the same!!
Unfortunately no real tales of pubs this trip, however will be going back so hopefully more info for the boozy traveller then!
One last thing, I was given a copy of the Quoran, and if you want to create a stir on international flight and at immigration I suggest carrying it in your hand luggage and reading it on the plane.
For one it reminds me of home - England, not Australia, despite the fact that it’s in the tropics and the temperature hardly ever drops below 30 degrees - Why? It’s the subtle little things;
The power point are the same as in the UK -there’s something reassuring about the big plug with a fuse in it; they have double yellow lines here and Marks and Spencer, this seems odd bearing in mind that:
I have no plugs that actually fit into those sockets
Double yellow lines usually equal bad thing
M&S in KL doesn’t sell prawn and mayo sarnies and seems to be the most expensive shop in the city - Armani’s cheaper than M&S!
For another its clean, modern, people are really friendly and stuff just works.
K.L.’s a really strange mix of old colonial buildings, and super modern high tech stuff like the Petronas Tower that was one of the worlds tallest building until the Taiwanese chucked up this little number: http://www.emporis.com/en/wm/ci/bu/mf/?id=101320 which is 509M.
The Petronas certainly one of the worlds best looking buildings which was omni-present when ever I looked out of my hotel window as they nicely upgraded me to have a champion view from the 25th floor, however if I felt like I was in Lost in Translation in Singapore the feeling was doubly so in KL as I was there all alone.
Public transport makes London transport look positively third world, well I guess that’s because it is, there’s a mono-rail system, light rail and high speed train that get you the 80KM from the airport at the speed of light, it was 2004 when I got on the train the train it was 2516 and the world was run by apes, so I took the train back to the airport, got a taxi and all was back to normal when I got back to the city.
I didn’t get much time to have a look around as I was working, I got taken on a bit a off sight-seeing by one of the guys I work with, who took me too the Islamic museum, which was pretty interesting, especially all the big swords and stuff, I didn’t see one tourist in there which was pretty cool and visited the new political district - Putra Jaya - which looked like Milton Keynes only with a huge mosque in the middle of a roundabout and the most ornate lampposts you have ever seen - which I failed to take any photos of, so you will just have to take my word for it.
I was, believe it or not stuck in a massive hail storm the first day I was there, gale force winds and hail stones the size of golf balls (which I thought was a little excessive for hail until I discovered that storms that rip up trees and telegraph poles are rare occurrences and my colleague had never even seen - ever), the eyes of the locals turned to me- seemingly I give new meaning to the term weatherman! - Was it a coincidence that every day after that, evening prayer time just happened to be just before someone gave me a lift to the station?
Got a taxi to an Irish bar to meet a colleague who lives there and obviously done an excellent job of assimilating into the community - not! Finally get to the bar and it cost me a (relative) fortune in the taxi - and I can’t believe that he hadn’t picked a closer bar, “why its only 10 minutes drive away!”
-We’ll yes maybe however my driver was obviously proud of his town and wanted to show me around - he did this by completing a full lap of the ring road surrounding the city!! Taxi drivers - all the same!!
Unfortunately no real tales of pubs this trip, however will be going back so hopefully more info for the boozy traveller then!
One last thing, I was given a copy of the Quoran, and if you want to create a stir on international flight and at immigration I suggest carrying it in your hand luggage and reading it on the plane.
Ian Thorp reports from sunny Singapore
I'm at a conference in Singapore paid for by a vendor. Five days in swanky hotel with a continuous stream of presentations on how to sell more of this vendor's equipment.
I'm not a salesman never have been. Despite that fact that the company I work is exclusively interested in making wads of cash I like to at least delude myself that my job is working for the 'greater good'- not sure for instance how helping a company rip up great tracts of land to get to the minerals below is for the greater good, but as I said - I like to delude myself.
However when the first presenter said in the first couple of minutes said '…and that will help you to make more money and after all that is what we are all here for' made me feel rather sick.
There are 500 Unix and sales people here so it's a really great fun crowd I feel like I'm Edward Norton in Fight Club when he starts going nuts in meetings, I keep getting the urge to stand up and abuse these people.
Staying at the Shangri-La apparently one of the best spots in town, its not bad, apparently it has 16 acres of gardens and a top swimming pool, not that I've had chance to enjoy them as I've been stuck inside listening to presentations on stuff I really couldn't give a monkeys about. I wake up in the morning and I'm in Lost in Translation as I open my electric curtains and stare out over a foreign city. Just to add to that feeling of disconnection from the real world the carpet in the lift has the day woven into it. I wonder who's idea it was to weave 'Tuesday' into the carpet - just in case I haven't switched the TV or read the complimentary.
One good thing is the free beer, its amazing what we will do for free beer, I was willing go to the opening of packet of crisps (not cheese and onion) if there is free beer and its not like I can't afford to buy the stuff myself - although when you're in Singapore and its US$20 a litre I'm not so sure.
Escaped the geeks and salesmen and ventured out for beer - I don't remember Singapore being quite as dodgy last time around. Also got the impression the local men are not very skilled in the kitchen -talking to one chap who'd lost a finger and when I asked him how he said it'd been with a carving knife -they really need to be more careful as I saw several guys in there with same injury maybe P&P need to expand into cooking schools for men.
I'm not a salesman never have been. Despite that fact that the company I work is exclusively interested in making wads of cash I like to at least delude myself that my job is working for the 'greater good'- not sure for instance how helping a company rip up great tracts of land to get to the minerals below is for the greater good, but as I said - I like to delude myself.
However when the first presenter said in the first couple of minutes said '…and that will help you to make more money and after all that is what we are all here for' made me feel rather sick.
There are 500 Unix and sales people here so it's a really great fun crowd I feel like I'm Edward Norton in Fight Club when he starts going nuts in meetings, I keep getting the urge to stand up and abuse these people.
Staying at the Shangri-La apparently one of the best spots in town, its not bad, apparently it has 16 acres of gardens and a top swimming pool, not that I've had chance to enjoy them as I've been stuck inside listening to presentations on stuff I really couldn't give a monkeys about. I wake up in the morning and I'm in Lost in Translation as I open my electric curtains and stare out over a foreign city. Just to add to that feeling of disconnection from the real world the carpet in the lift has the day woven into it. I wonder who's idea it was to weave 'Tuesday' into the carpet - just in case I haven't switched the TV or read the complimentary.
One good thing is the free beer, its amazing what we will do for free beer, I was willing go to the opening of packet of crisps (not cheese and onion) if there is free beer and its not like I can't afford to buy the stuff myself - although when you're in Singapore and its US$20 a litre I'm not so sure.
Escaped the geeks and salesmen and ventured out for beer - I don't remember Singapore being quite as dodgy last time around. Also got the impression the local men are not very skilled in the kitchen -talking to one chap who'd lost a finger and when I asked him how he said it'd been with a carving knife -they really need to be more careful as I saw several guys in there with same injury maybe P&P need to expand into cooking schools for men.
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