Listening.

Some more blogging today, just to post some music. I've been intending to review stuff properly, but I've been busy. Sorry there.

First of all, one of my favourite Delia Derbyshire pieces that is not on the Electrosonic LP, Ziw-Zih Ziw-Zih Oooo-Oooo Oooo-Oooo, allegedly deemed too sexy for BBC edutainment in the 1960s. Seriously. Don't make me cite sources, I can't be arsed right now. Google it or something.

I'm late on the Yeasayer bandwagon. I am aware of this. But I am really loving All Hour Cymbals in a big way. Listen to 2080 and then tell everyone you know.

Sian Alice Group are an amazing band, whose genre-spanning 59.59 has had me captivated all morning. This is Murder.

I rather think it's high time I updated my imeem rotation playlist...

Meanwhile, these things.

The only time dEUS ever really grabbed me was with their 1998 album, The Ideal Crash (which is still pretty ace, by the way), and The Knife's appeal is mostly lost on me (except for one or two songs, like Heartbeats, obviously). Still, I went out of my way to find a rip of this collaboration between dEUS and Karin Dreijer Anderson, called Slow. And it's pretty cool; nice pace, builds tension well between the live players and the electronic performers, and the vocal interplay is very effective. Good bit of stuff. Very enjoyable. More of this sort of thing, please!



Album imminent from Does It Offend You, Yeah?. Oh god they're so painfully trendy, I should just scoop out my brain and stuff the cavity with Pritt-sticks right now. Can't help it, I love this band. Listen now.

Sunday Songs.

I intend to do this regularly, but I've so far been rubbish at it. Bah.

Today's playlist looks like this:



Starting with a Beirut double, because I think Zach Condon is an amazing talent and I've been listening to Lon Gisland a lot this week. The instrumental number presented here, My Family's Role in the World Revolution is simply great stompy fun, with a catchy melody. It sticks in my head like no-one's business. The second track on today's playlist is the SON LUX remix of A Sunday Smile, here because I'm very excited that At War with Walls and Mazes drops this week, and because it's a gorgeous remix, and because it's got Sunday in the title. The beat on this remix is suitably chunky, but it's not really a dance remix, it's an electronic recasting of the Beirut song. It's intense and builds to a particularly fraught finish.

Sun Against My Eyes is a moving piece for guitar and clarinet from the recent Colleen album, Les Ondes Silenciesuses, and definitely my favourite thing from that album. It's probably the single most beautiful piece of music I listened to in 2007.

Plone, a long defunct Warp act, are near the top of my Should Have Released More Than One Album List. Unfortunately, their second album was lost in the ether after they were axed by Warp. Sadness. Bibi Plone is playful electronic silliness, characteristic of their album For Beginner Piano. It's charming in it's wide-eyed innocence, like Richard D. James Album with the beats stripped right down. That's not to say it's unsophisticated; it's cute, but clever.

The Hype Machine is one of the best things to happen to the internet in forever, and has helped me discover new (old) and interesting things. In a roundabout kind of way, it led to me picking up this compilation called The Brazilian Funk Experience, which is enormous fun and I expect will dominate my summer. Maita by Doris Monteiro (1977) is a clear highlight, a breezy, blissful slice of sun-drenched pop. Perfect Sunday soundtracking.

del.icio.us is also a fantastic resource, and it's there I found Awesome Tapes from Africa. I'm not sure I can adequately describe Assalatu by Abdou Salam et les Tendistes, but I can tell you that it's propulsive and addictive. Write that down in your copybooks now.

Finally, oh, I am addicted to Made in the Dark by Hot Chip. They've finally hit their mark and released a frankly brilliant pop record. Here's the title track, a sweet, sweet little ballad that makes me feel all squishy.

Mansun and Serialisation.

I was contacted last week by an old schoolfriend through the magic of Facebook. This is not a friendship I have any particular interest in rekindling, but it is at least notable for being responsible for my ongoing relationship with the Tom, so that's something.

Anyway, this guy, for no reason, messages me through the Facebooks to tell me he's been re-listening to Six by Mansun. Well, we both got it when it came out in '98 and enjoyed it a great deal, so I suppose there's that, but I'm still not sure why he needed to tell me about it. Anyway, with this message came the assertion that if Six was released now, "it would be a major critical success". Now, Christ help me, I can't help but tell people exactly how wrong they are. I do really enjoy it. I am not such a good human being in that respect.

In the course of this deconstruction, I expressed the opinion that Mansun would likely only achieve critical acclaim in 2008 with Six if they serialised the album online; "releasing a song every fortnight with lyrics and maybe additional text to give it a more cohesive narrative. Put it out under Creative Commons license, make individual instrument tracks available in .aif format for remixers, all that kinda thing. They would win the Internet. Cory Doctorow would write a very enthusiastic Guardian piece." (I really do get like this. I am an arsehole, I know.)

Me and the Tom had briefly discussed, only the day before, the idea of recording individual songs and making them available online, complete with artwork, lyrics, .aif files for remixers, but I'm enjoying this idea of serialised releases. I'm imagining having six or seven songs to make up an EP or mini-album, and then releasing it song by song over a number of weeks. Lovebomb the blogosphere, get everyone talking about you, and with a schedule of releases over a specific period of time, you've got more chance of keeping the internet and all its mates interested than if you're posting songs with sporadic infrequency.

With good presentation, and the ability to spread the word to enough people and blogs, serialised releases could really make an impact on the internet and give unsigned artists a boost. As a music fan, I'd love to be collecting albums and EPs on a fortnightly basis. Check my inbox on a Saturday morning, download a clutch of new tunes, and spend a lazy hour poring over the supplemental material online. Whole communities and fora would spring up around this kind of activity. It's what web 2.0 is all about, isn't it?

As always, here is some music.

FFS Goldfrapp.

Oh, Goldfrapp. I'm giving up on you. Felt Mountain was astonishing. Black Cherry was forgettable, and Supernature was an electropop cleftbaby that upset me a great deal. So, y'know, when I heard A&E, I thought, "ooh, how lovely" and got a bit excited for Seventh Tree.



Sadly, Seventh Tree is brain-pulpingly tedious. There's no substance here; just wispy, whimsical laptop folk-pop that mistakes production for songwriting. I absolutely cannot recall a single melody or phrase from anything on it other than A&E, which was nice enough as a single, but here becomes swallowed by the bland monotony of the rest of the record.

Any time I saw Alison Goldfrapp doing publicity for Supernature, she seemed thoroughly bored, her gaze fixed and her mouth doing an impression of a bumhole packed with wasps. Seventh Tree is the product of that waspy-bumface. Go home, now, Goldfrapp. Do not darken our doors again.

Sunday Songs.

Sundays are weird. You can never quite get settled, there's loads of shit to do, but you also just want to sit and do nothing for as long as you think you can get away with it. Unfortunately, we've got the decorators in this week, so today has been a bit stressful, with moving furniture around and things. So, here is this Sunday's playlist, a little bit fraught and entirely melancholy.

My Dark Star is one of the amazing Suede bees that makes Sci-Fi Lullabies the most important Suede release you can own (aside from dog man star). It could easily have been a single. The pretty piano and fuzzy guitar stabs underpin a tempered, yet still anthemic chorus. Simply brilliant.

Monkey Swallows The Universe have a brilliant name that gives nothing away. I like that about them. Sheffield Shanty is the lead track from The Bright Carvings, a bold statement given its wholly understated nature. Sheffield Shanty is blissful and beguiling, even as it tips its hat to Paul Simon's You Can Call Me Al.

Everyone loses their shit over Burial. I enjoyed Untrue, but found it pretty repetitive, 'though naggingly addictive. Weird thing. Bloc Party are the band I would lose my shit over if I were fifteen again, but I detest Flux. The Burial remix of Where Is Home, available on the Flux 12", and probably iTunes or something, is a jaw-dropping track. It perfectly captures that ethereal, Ghost in the Machine vibe that everyone attributes to Burial. For my money, it's better realised than anything on Untrue.

Think Tank was a horribly patchy affair, one which I think killed Blur dead. Ambulance was such a fuckin' tease though. The stuttering percussion and rubbery bass are a perfect intro, the honking sax and Damon's sweetest vocals all made it an outstanding addition to the Blur cannon. I almost believed Think Tank wouldn't totally suck. Still, top tune, perfect Sunday music.

Finally, Genio is a crazy man who has been playing People Are People at open mics in London for at least five years. I was thrilled to get a recorded version from Bedsprings a week ago. It's a creaky, hoary thing, but fantastic for it. Just listen to it. 'Kay?

Playlist 050208

Just a couple of songs I'm poking today.

Cassettes Won't Listen are a new one on me, but I'm totally charmed by Lunch For Breakfast. The warm, fuzzy keytones fill me with nostalgic contentment. Don't disagree with my warm fuzzies. They do not like to be challenged.

Break by Son Lux is fucking awesome. After a jarring, rattling intro is peeled away, there's a broken, fraught and very pretty song being buffeted on currents of far-away samples and loops. It's a fantastic, tense piece and I'm really excited to hear this guys album at the end of the month.

Playlist 040208

I'm still finding out what this blog is for. My intention is to blog original music and keep records of my DJing gigs. However, strife at the the Fly is hampering my DJing exploits and I keep accidentally writing music for We'll Write. Which is cool, obviously, but the idea of Tincanphone is to record more basic, noisy things, mostly for my own amusement.

In the meantime, I'm going to blog about music I'm listening to, because I enjoy that sort of thing, and I'm doing fuck all else.

Today, I have been seduced by new hipster NME-cool-list-fodder Foals. Let's be honest here. If you see the song title Tron (Is a Great Film) of course you're going to want to check it, regardless of your wariness for anything bearing the NME Stamp Of Utter Cuntwittery. Fortunately, it's as good as its title. Kinetic, slightly clever guitar-and-keys pop is so dangerously fashionable right now, and I'm sure there's a wanky "post-" genre tag on it, but I'm getting too old to let preconceptions stand in the way of my enjoyment of quality tunes.

Likewise, MGMT are so overblogged already I wonder if my even mentioning them is redundant. However, Electric Feel is some funky shit, and almost certainly 2008's D.A.N.C.E. Check it.

Finally, Subtle are a genuine phenomenon and one band I'd recommend to every living soul (except for the Tom). Unlikely Rock Shock is the first track to emerge from the forthcoming Exiting ARM, and it makes every inch of my brain very happy.

(mp3s are for sampling purposes. if you are the copyright owner of a file, and would like it removed, simply email me)