Dust particles

Still in Denmark (blog posts here, here and here) and I’m finding that, as I pointlessly dust myself down (another dust storm coming soon, well not storm, just 100,000 people kicking up dry dirt) my mind isn’t wandering off into thinking about Fairtrade whips or publishing ideas anymore.

Perhaps it is being weary, perhaps it is being wary of just sounding stupid when I spend precious moments of keeping my sunburn in the shade writing nonchalantly about nonsense.

I have been reading a lot about people writing books on rock stars. Record Collector features editor and sometimes Bearded contributor Jason Draper is soon to have a book published on Prince, and Plan B scribe Stevie Chick has recently had a book on Sonic Youth commissioned.

It got me thinking on who would be the subject of my first great rock novel. I concluded that given my dedication to independent music and my love of obscure, unique and inspirational songs my subject matter would be John Dwyer (of Coachwhips, Thee Oh Sees, Pink & Brown… err… fame). I interviewed him a month ago when Thee Oh Sees played in London and he was a great character, amazing interviewee because he just told tale after tale. From a man who once attacked an audience member with his guitar during a Hospitals gig, I was more than surprised.

So if there are any publishers out there who want an awesome rock and roll story about one of music’s biggest but most ingenious self-proclaimed arsehole, give me a call.

Currently listening to ‘Boredom’ by The Buzzcocks (through a barn door)

In the meantime…

I’m blogging on Roskilde whilst out in the field, you can of course keep up-to-date via www.beardedmagazine.co.uk.

You can view the first post here.

Video killed the video star

With Glastonbury underway for the unwashed and the overpaid, I decided there was no better way to celebrate my non appearance than with seven bottles of the now commercially available Brothers cider (a fitting correlation with the festival’s own commercialisation over the past few years).

While in the public house, I couldn’t stop staring at the plasma screen that, fresh from showing the Spain – Russia game, was going through an array of popular music videos past and present. It got me thinking about the medium, but also taught me a few things along the way.

Lessons learnt included that I quite like a song by the Ting Tings and that the green in the video for Hot Chip’s ‘Over and Over’ is rather alluring and similar to the colour of the bizarre Pimms concoction I was presented with at a private view earlier in the day. Most notably though, I realised that, despite this invaluable learning experience, video is really a dying medium.

It may seem a little obtuse, I mean, technology has given everyone the chance to make videos and the internet has given everyone a perfect, free distribution channel but doesn’t the fact that EVERYONE can make a music video make it a overcrowded, overrated stagnated video jungle?

An episode from the last season of South Park made a point in lambasting the US writers’ strike that there is little money to be made by videos on the internet. Youtube stars become famous flash in the pans but nobody gives them money because their, let’s loosely call it, talent has already been whored out for a cheap taste of fame.

The argument with music of course is that this whoring is good promotion for the artists. Which, to an extent it is. Personally though, although I have realised that a Ting Tings song made me tap my foot, I’m not going to rush out and buy the album and listening to the same track on Radio One would have given me the same reaction, so why bother with the video?

For less popular independent artists, most make videos and few get past rarely viewed Myspace or Youtube links, and barely any translate into record sales. Jezus Factory’s Paul Hawkins & Thee Awkward Silences have made two videos for the superlative ‘The Evil Thoughts’ but they haven’t sold out of a 200 run of singles, priced at a measly £3 each with an awesome split side with Lil’ Lost Lou. You should buy one here.

What benefit does making a video have? In the age of Myspace, which despite its lack of usefulness as an A&Rs home is still good for checking on bands you’ve heard of somewhere else, you can hear released and non released tracks by artists at the click of a button. It saves on the costs of indies who would be better using their money to invest into artists or just marketing their releases better and it’ll allow artists to spend their time honing their craft rather than pissing about in frog outfits.

Spot the difference:
The Ting Tings – Great DJ

Paul Hawkins & Thee Awkward Silences – The Evil Thoughts

What do I listen to?

As I’m sure you can imagine, whenever I meet people for the first time (and it’s happening quite regularly at the moment), one of the questions I inevitably get asked is ‘what are you listening to at the moment?’

My High Fidelity moment is coming… I clam up and say a lot of uhs and ahs, it’s not very eloquent either way. The reason is simply that I barely remember, Last.fm used to do the job for me, but I’m listening to more and more vinyl and fewer and fewer Mp3s. Also, my girlfriend has started to pollute it somewhat, listening to too much Radiohead.

So what I’d like to do is take my time and mention a few artists who are new and exciting me at the moment, they are, in whatever order I remember them:

Paul Hawkins & Thee Awkward Silences (Jezus Factory) – awesome live, great lyrics, nice chaps
Gablé (Loaf: ) – best album of 2008 thus far
The John Baker Tapes – coming out on Trunk shortly, absolutely brilliant
Beestung Lips (Capsule) – although they’re not particularly new at the moment

And I think that’s it really, I’ve been listening to a lot of Ninja High School and the Dawn of the Dead incidental music soundtrack recently as well.

The Chronicles of Bearded

Why am I starting what seems to be my twenty-third blog? Well, because I was asked to.

Not exactly ‘asked’, more encouraged. It seems people get interested in my tales of woe surrounding a magazine I started.

Perhaps not ‘woe’ (I hate inverted commas and I’ve used them plenty in this first post), perhaps tales of the rollercoaster of running a project set up out of love and a desire to help the people who matter most in this world get a break from the advertising hungry, big label hugging music publications of yore without any tiny element of business sense.

This sudden burst of inspiration could be triggered by a desire to get said magazine wider coverage, it could be a result of my own personal narcissism, to get more relevant results when you type my name into Google (although if you look at Google images, the first result is of me clearly telling a fabulous joke – I come in ahead of Gareth Gates too, which is nice).

Searching for myself on Google, aside from the obvious personal insecurities this may or may not highlight to the casual reader, it gives me a chance to take a glance back at my personal triumphs and tribulations of what <John Peel Quote>we’ll laughably call my career</John Peel Quote>.

For example, I noticed that in 2006, when I did the odd bit of scribing for the still excellent music website Twisted Ear, there is a list of what we/are my favourite albums of that year. They were, in a particular order:

1. Joanna Newson – Ys
2. Scott Walker – The Drift
3. Kazoo Funk Orchestra – Midnight Finger Painter
4. Sufjan Stevens – The Avalanche
5. The Flaming Lips – At War With the Mystics
6. Fucked Up – Hidden World
7. Thom Yorke – The Eraser
8. Coachwhips – Double Death
9. Calexico – Garden Ruin
10. Venetian Snares – Cavalcade of Glee and Dadaist Happy Hardcore Pom Poms

Which, although I tend to wildly vary my musical tastes at times, is a pretty accurate reflection of how I feel 2006 probably was for music – not that great. If I were to rewrite the list, the lovely Joanna would still come first as Ys is probably one of the greatest records ever made. No ifs, no buts, any record that has an orchestral score written by Van Dyke Parks is well deserving of greatness.

What I feel would change is Calexico and The Flaming Lips would drop off to be replaced by Alela Diane’s The Pirate’s Gospel and Trunk records’ amazing compilation Fuzzy Felt Folk would rocket up the chart to number three (because The Drift is a phenomenal piece of work).

As much as it pains me, the genius of Venetian Snares would probably drop off the list too, if only to squeeze in Bill Wells & Maher Shalal Hash Baz’s quite astounding Osaka Bridge. Other notable mentions from 2006 go to David Shrigley and his spoken word record Forced to Speak With Others, Grandmaster Gareth’s The Party Sounds of Grandmaster Gareth, Wisby’s Dirty Fan Male and Yppah’s You are Beautiful at all Times.

In fact, what do all these changes tell us about music in 2006? That is was pretty good? Or is there a different lesson to be learnt? The fact that no matter how forward thinking you are, the more you look for the next great record, there is probably a huge trail of ingenious music lying hidden in the past.

Currently listening to: Dawn of the Dead – unreleased incidental music (Trunk)