The shiny new iPhone headphone adapter for Lightning isn’t actually powerful enough to drive headphones properly, and Bluetooth linking inexplicably doesn’t work so well for non-Apple headphones.
Read More
Month: September 2016
Radio and television finally admit, in 2016, that they’re competing with the whole vast Internet.
The mass media have suffered the effects of the Internet much in the manner of the record industry, as consumers, conclusively sick of their shit, withdraw their attention. Their worry has gone from piracy to … being ignored.
Read More
Reviews: Növö, District 13, Adhere to Form, Seattle Fix (2016).
Industrial atmospherics, EBM synthpop, ’80s old synth work and dreampop on real instruments.
Read More
The streamingpocalypse first hit the record industry in the 1930s. It was called radio.
The music industry occasionally forgets that entertainment is an optional expense, consumer confidence is a critical material condition for what they do, and when times are tough people stop spending.
Read More
Post-punk links: More secret histories.
Michel Duval and various Crépuscule bands, Mark Reeder, Dominatrix, the non-white and non-male nature of punk and post-punk, the Fall and what to do with ex-punk survivor’s guilt.
Read More
The overwhelming historical importance of the Beatles, and why Live At The Hollywood Bowl is revelatory.
The trouble with the Beatles is not that they aren’t mindbogglingly important (they are) or indeed actually good (they are), it’s that you can’t get away from them even in 2016. They are actually so famous and so important that it’s almost impossible in the present day to understand how and why.
Read More
More recovered articles from Rocknerd v1.
A few more recoveries, lovingly hand-ported from archive.org. Wind the schadenfreude back to 2001-2002. RIAA hacks! The Continental Cafe! The Vivendi Universal meltdown!
Read More
Rowland S. Howard and his albatross, “Shivers”. (And more.)
Rowland S. Howard plays his albatross “Shivers” on ABC TV Studio 22, 25 November 1999. The band is Rowland with Brian Hooper on bass, Mick Harvey on drums and Edward Clayton Jones on keyboard. And a lot more stuff.
Read More
Hey, ho! Let’s go! Punk rock links.
Pavarotti’s “Blitzkrieg Bop”, Kill Your Pet Puppy retrospective, a contemporary punk novel, Manchester punk history, Czechoslovak punk history, Scottish post-punk history and a children’s picture book on punk. The secret histories.
Read More
Industrial reviews: Aesthetische, Mari Kattman, Cyanotic, Syntec (2016).
Selections from the industrial/EBM/synthpop axis.
Read More
Brian Eno knows the score.
It’s been a busy day, have an illustrious musician tweet.
Read More
On this day in 2015 … gettin’ piggy with it.
At approximately 10:20pm BST on Sunday the 20th of September, 2015, the image of the Daily Mail‘s Monday front page hit Twitter. And Britain exploded.
Read More
Reviews: Arsia Line, The Primary Colors, Lindy Vision (2016).
Black Native angular post-punk, psychedelic garage and some straight-up witch house.
Read More
Arts Council of England to introduce quantitative performance metrics across all cultural endeavours. Seriously.
In an attempt at the prize for most fatuous bureaucratic innovation of the decade, Arts Council England plans, against all non-conflicted recommendations, to impose a standardised numerical system for arts quality on its national portfolio organisations.
Read More
Synthpop: Crystal, Vile Electrodes, Hante (2016).
Synthwave with vocals, English synthpop scene and the darkwave end.
Read More
The Blackbird Violin: CARVED FROM HIS GRANDFATHER’S TOMBSTONE. AND MAMMOTH TUSKS.
Violinists and violists can stop complaining about the weight of their half-kilo instrument. Ladeez gemmun, we present: the Blackbird. Carved from the sculptor’s grandfather’s tombstone. A shade over two kilograms.
Read More
Synthpop: Syntec, Torul (2016), Curxes (2015).
Industrial mellows out to EBM, and synthpop goes the other way.
Read More
Christian Fitness: like a western Mark Smith.
Christian Fitness is the one-man band of Andrew “Falco” Falkous of Cardiff post-hardcore (so, punk) band Future of the Left, and formerly of Mclusky. Focused and apposite punk ranting, sarcastic and angry, backed by a bloody racket with good tunes and at least half way decent recording.
Read More
More Bitcoin spammers for your amusement, or mine at least.
Two copies of this just hit the email box. Why don’t you follow the link they want to give me $30 to put their link on. I’ll just be waiting here.
Read More
Stephen Witt: How Music Got Free (2015, 2016).
This purports to be the story of the last twenty years of the record industry, told by one of the kids who collected MP3s in his college dorm just before Napster. It isn’t the story of the MP3 revolution, but it is some stories, only one of which is seriously important to the claim in the title. But the details mostly aren’t wrong.
Read More
Links: floor-sweepings editions, musician forums, Piracy: The Better Choice.
A site for multi-disc reissues, a new musicians’ forum, DRM still doesn’t work, exclusive deals don’t work.
Read More
Post-punk: Belgrado, Radar Eyes, Rakta (2016).
Post-punk rock bands that aren’t quite g*th but are certainly leaning in that direction.
Read More
Links: Beatles, Prince Buster, Freddie Mercury age 12, Freddie Nietzsche.
The Beatles’ Live At The Hollywood Bowl recovered, Prince Buster obituary, Freddie Mercury aged 12, Nietzsche the composer.
Read More
Fenris Wulf: Loki’s Child (2016 edition). A witty political satire using pop music! I bet you’re delighted already.
Every field has its standard ways to fuck up.
Read More
All guitars: No Sister, Dot Dash, Susan, Strange Passage (2016).
Post-hardcore indie rock, punk pop, power punk pop and jangle punk.
Read More
Pel Mel have a live album and a best-of coming out.
Pel Mel were an Australian post-punk indie-pop band who formed in Newcastle in 1979 and split in 1984. Like so many old post-punk bands, they’ve reformed in recent years, and have a collection and a live album out soon.
Read More
Links: how Deerful and J. G. Ballard work, how Warner Bros doesn’t, what to do in Norwich afterwards.
Secrets of the stars!
Read More
Post-punk: La Femme, Nothing, Les Panties (2016).
Post-punk via yéyé, shoegaze and new wave revival.
Read More
The Hugos, the Sad Puppies and 1970s science fiction paperback covers, which were ridiculous.
The thing that really struck me about Hugo vote-stackers the Sad Puppies was founder Brad Torgersen’s lament that he could no longer tell from the cover of a science fiction novel what it was about.
Read More
Reviews: MRCH, Chelan, Floor Cry (2016).
Electronic indie delights, with guitar.
Read More