singles by choice
(albums when it's necessary)
25 June 2022
listening through speakersAvid Acutus
Funk F·XRII
Benz Micro LP-S
Linn Klimax DS (Renew)
TEAD Mastergroove Mk 2
TEAD Vibe Phoenix / Pulse 2
TEAD Linear A mk 2
TEAD Model One

A few more “do I like that?”s picked out as I weed some crap out of The Collection.

LunaSmile
12" single

Let’s get rid of that last bit of “indie cred” I might have hanging around, by explaining that I’m not particularly a Galaxie 500 fan, and I prefer all the stuff all of them have done since.

Dean Wareham has a gift for a pop tune, and the further he gets from the Velvet Underground, the more I like him. He reverts to type with a Lou Reed guitar solo on the title track, but otherwise side one is hi-fidelity, beautifully executed pop music all the way. Both songs are from an album called Lunapark, which I don’t have, and which probably costs a fortune now.

The ‘b’ gets a bit more alternative, with Rollercoaster cranking up the reverb and the general frenzy. Finally there’s a demo of Hey Sister, which has a Velvet Underground title, but doesn’t sound too much like them. I’m keeping this.

4
12" single

Electronic novelty soap-opera mash-up classic from 2000. Loads of samples from golden-era EastEnders, mostly Pet Shop Boys collaborator Barbara Windsor calling Pat Butcher a cow, and in return being called a bitch, but with a bit of dialog between Frank Butcher and Roy (Evans?) fleshing it out. The music is mostly the EastEnders theme tune, and it’s about as good as I made it sound. I like that EastEnders is Pascal-cased.

The ‘b’ is called Cut up Nonsense. It starts with (I think) Mark Goodier doing the top 40 with all the artist names removed. It’s not as good as the dance chart rundowns that Chris Morris used to do. Beast of Beetroot; Anaesthetics at the Birth of a Potato; Catatonia’s Cerys ironing beans in the background; you know. Then there’s a bit of self-referential stuff about the a-side and it’s all rather a waste of everyone’s time. You’d be far better off digging out that Cassetteboy thing about the world’s hardest slag. I have a ceramic cat in my office called Captain Sanil Crasto, in honour of that.

As for the record, I’d sell it, but no one would buy.

1
12" single

Another dreaded remix EP, though we do get the “original version” as a reference point.

The original is pretty boring and doesn’t strike me as a song you could do a lot with in a remix. It’s the same all the way through, and it’s got no dynamics or particular points of interest. We’ll see. I assume the people doing the remixing are a lot more creative than I am.

Not really. One loops the vocal. Boring. One sounds like your headphone cable needs resoldering. Boring. One’s noisy. Not bad. One is called Midnight F–k Remix. There’s no need for that is there?

M83 is the southern pinwheel galaxy. I still remember a few Messier numbers, but I had to look that one up. 15 million light years. Think about that for a minute. Contemplate the silence of space, the infinity of time. Try to imagine the size of a filament. Go and read about The Dark Era. Learn your place.

2
12" single

DJ Frenchbloke did that brilliant mash-up of I’m too Sexy and The Model, and here he’s mashing up bits of Jerry Springer: The Opera with a bunch of stuff which, Sly Stone apart, I can’t quite put my finger on. He’s good at it though. Slicker than snot.

We used to love Jerry Springer in our house, back in the day. It all seems quaint now, with its strippers, and its cheaters, and its kissin’ cousins. You hear me talkin, hillbilly boy? Reality TV was entertaining, when it exploited the people who went on it. Now it is a lie, exploiting the people who watch it, and it’s not entertaining at all.

People still like, of course, to watch and judge people who are different from them. But now, instead of being “weird”, they’re “brave”. Inspirational, not crazy. But you ain’t watching no two-ton family because you care about them, you’re watching them because they’re huge and fat and you wonder how they do it, just the same as when they were on Jerry Springer. But now it’s all framed so everyone feels good about themselves, and everyone had access to professional counsellors, and call this number if you’re affected by any of the issues in tonight’s programme, and in a way it’s worse, because the cruelty is dressed as kindness.

I wasn’t all that keen on Jerry Springer: The Opera, but probably only because I hate opera. Can’t tolerate the voices, especially the women. It’s an impressive technical feat and all, and the tunes are great, but it goes through me like the proverbial nails on the proverbial blackboard. Or Kylie. I always imagined Book of Mormon would be more to my taste, but I never got round to seeing it, and I’m never in London any more, so I probably never will.

3
12" single

The last of tonight’s black-sleeved 12” cut-up novelty things that apparently were all the rage in the first years of the century. Now you’d just stick it on YouTube and forget about it, and that feels like progress.

What you’ve got here is a speech by George Bush Jr, edited by Chris Morris to switch the context so that instead of the speaker condemning horrors, he advocates them. It’s not particularly clever, and it’s not even all that well done. In fact, it’s as trite and obvious as a Banksy, and it hasn’t even aged well given that, compared to most of what’s come since, George Bush Jr now feels like a great statesman.

The three other tracks are Chris Morris’s track set to different musical backgrounds. No one makes it any more interesting than it was to start with. Buttery Biscuit Bass is better done, and little less insightful.

Unlikely to be pruning the bumfluff in the nation’s spazgarage any time soon.

1
12" single

I’m not sure exactly what this is. Possibly Four Tet remixing Rothko on one side, and Rothko remixing themselves on the other? I don’t know, but I’ll tell you what I do know: it’s class.

The Four Tet side is beautifully put together, varied and inventive, spinning worlds around the Rothko’s signature bass chord thing.

Rothko’s side whips along, loads up the noise and the flute it’s over all too soon. Rothko were always underrated and underappreciated. I’d take them over Mogwai any time.

It’s nice to finish on a high. I’m really tired.

4