Been a bit distracted today, as I've been engaged in a Sisyphean task to try and compile all the catalogue numbers of the Factory label, including the cat, Rob Gretton's dental work and so on. Further to my Robert Wyatt review yesterday, I now have a fraction more info to flesh out my impressions.
I've been promising to write about this Robert Wyatt album for quite a while now, I'm aware. But it's been hard to blog about this one. Not because of any problems with the music - it's wonderful, actually. The problem I'm finding is that listening to "Comicopera" is a kind of immersive experience, so much so that it's hard to come out of it with a critical angle.
I was talking recently to fellow Uncut Bob fanatic Damien Love, ostensibly about a feature we are working on together for Uncut’s looming 10th anniversary issue. Pretty soon, however, the conversation had drifted somewhat in the direction of Dylan bootlegs – the alternative Bob universe, if you like – and what might be the best of them.
I just noticed this morning that Jack White has two albums coming out on June 18. There's the White Stripes' "Icky Thump", and then there's "Hentch-Forth.Five" by The Hentchmen.
It ends, pretty much, with fireworks and Sinatra, somewhat appropriate, you would think, for a film series that privileges Vegas cool over substance like the Oceans movies do.
To Cargo in East London last night, for the long-awaited UK debut (by me, at least) of Oakley Hall. If you've not come across them before, Oakley Hall are a six-piece from Brooklyn who play a kind of driving, euphoric country psych. The two albums they released last year indicated that they were probably a pretty roistering live band.
Over the weekend, I watched the new BBC documentary series, Seven Ages Of Rock, which on Saturday night was dedicated to punk. A lot of it seemed inevitably familiar, but I perked up as I always do with the footage of The Sex Pistols' Jubilee boat trip, which I was on, standing about four feet in front of Johnny Rotten as a heaving crowd went hysterical and police launches surrounded us as the Pistols hammered out a defiant "Anarchy In The UK" as we cruised past the Houses Of Parliament.
What seems like several months since I heard The White Stripes' "Icky Thump", I finally had a few more listens to it over the weekend. Reassuringly, my usual hysterical over-excitement seems to have been pretty justified.
In these heady days of New Rave and such, it was heartening to be reminded this morning of the last time British bands tried to pull off that trick. "Warming Up The Brain Farm: The Best Of The Lo-Fidelity All Stars" turned up in the post. And amazingly, ten years on, it sounds great.
