Stegzy's Music Project

A commentary on Stegzy's album collection

Jul 14

Angels Fall First – Nightwish [#73]

by stegzy

Screen Shot 2014-06-09 at 17.02.48 Angels Fall First – Nightwish

Long ago, deep deep in the forests of the snow bound lands of the bearded Vikings men gathered and sang of the faerie folk and mystical things too mystical for our closed modern minds to comprehend.

Spin forward several centuries and they’re at it again, complete with huge chested Valkyries, heavy metal guitars and lots of chugga-chugga riffs.

This album was my first experience of Nightwish. With it came a desire to visit Finland and see the forests and voluptuous valkyries while drinking salmiakki and growing a beard. The music had the added bonus of “This is shit get it off” chants from the wife. Of course, I didn’t, I just lapped it up in Lapland, sought out other similar artists and probably damaged my credibility as a music lover along the way.

But I don’t care. I was into Nightwish before metal hipsters. That makes me cool.

 

1997 Nightwish

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Jul 13

Album #72 = Angel’s Egg – Gong

by stegzy

Screen Shot 2014-06-06 at 19.51.48Angel’s Egg – Gong (1973)

Take one impressionable teenager. Play them The Flying Teapot Radio Gnome Part 1. Sit back and wait.

I bought this in on CD in 1990 after having my mind blown by The Flying Teapot. Gong are kind of like Bonzo Dog Doo Dah band meets King Crimson. Jazz, with bizarre fantasy world inspired lyrics and a hell of a lot of jazz influence.

Several years later I was at Sheffield Hallam University and Gong were playing at the Nelson Mandela building (now demolished). Of course I was too shy to go and see them by myself and regret that I never had the balls to do so. I would probably have given up on them there and then.

French band, Gong’s second Radio Gnome but fifth album tells the story of Zero, the hero, and his continuing exploits on the planet Gong with the Pot Head Pixies. Yes, you guessed it, this album is heavily drug inspired. Perfect for your spotty teenager in the early to mid nineties at a time of naive mysticism and pre-millennial optimism. Great stuff, if only for a song about vaginas.

1973 Gong Virgin

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Jul 12

Anderson Bruford Wakeman Howe – Anderson Bruford Wakeman Howe [#71]

by stegzy

Screen Shot 2014-06-06 at 19.10.20Anderson Bruford Wakeman Howe (ABWH)

ABWH by ABWH is an album that slots in between Big Generator and Union in the pantheon of Yes albums. Oh, yes, you probably won’t be aware of what happened.

As frequently happens with Yes, there are often little tiffs between members, some members want to do something one style, while the others throw their toys out the pram and say they want to do it a different way.

Case in point. Listen to any Yes album pre-90125. The style is different. You can hear how the style has evolved sure, but it’s definitely a different paradigm shift is styles. The younger, cooler, less hippy members of the band went “We want to do an album like this” while the pye eyed hippy lot went “No but we want to do one as well”

Unfortunately you can’t have two bands with the same name formed of members, old and new. No. It just won’t do (Are you reading this Renaissance, Deep Purple etc?)

So what you do in a situation like that? When your older band mates come along and say “Hey, lets make an album?” Well you make an album. Of course the existing member of Yes at the time (White, Squire, Kaye and Rabin) went “Oi! No! Not as Yes you don’t” and so began a long battle for the rights to use the band name Yes.

In the meanwhile, ABWH produced an album and this is that album. Jon Anderson, Steve Howe, Rick “Grumpy” Wakeman and Bill “I’ve met Stegzy Gnomepants” Bruford. It’s full of Anderson mystique, Howe and Wakeman twiddly and Bruford boshbishbashing. It’s a show off album. It says “Listen to us! We’re old but we can still do stuff”. Yeah.

It’s ok.

It’s not great.

It’s ok.

Its definitely of the time, late eighties, early nineties. You can tell from the tribal and African influences. To me it’s too twee for the time. It’s certainly an album of talent, but it’s like 10 years too late. The style is very Peter Gabriel and you can tell Squire isn’t about because the bass just isn’t as fiddly.

Spin forward a few years, the band reconciled their differences and recorded Union. Another pile of tosh. More of that later.

 

1989 Yes

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Jul 11

Album #70 = And She closed Her Eyes – Stina Nordenstam

by stegzy

STINAAnd She Closed Her Eyes – Stina Nordenstam

Odd.

This is, apparently, a genre called New Weird America. Or so I’m told. By hipsters.

I am officially cool. I’m okay with this album. I don’t like it. I don’t hate it. I’m okay with it. That, and looking aloof, makes me cool.

However, because I don’t wear stupid hats, half mast trousers or half of a scrap metal yard in my ear, ironically, I’m not a hipster. Nor would I want to be.

The soft mellow jazzesque notes, bizarre child like and haunting tones of Ms Nordenstam and the simple repetitive melodies  make this like a soft tickly aural touch to your ears, similar to a light soft feathery touch you might have on your skin during some semi-somnambulistic sexiness.

One step away from a soul patch and a beret. Not too bad.

 

Stina Nordenstam

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Jul 10

Album #69 – Anastasis – Dead Can Dance

by stegzy

Screen Shot 2014-06-06 at 16.55.31 Anastasis – Dead Can Dance

We, so Brendan Perry sings, are the children of the sun in the first track on this long awaited album. Anastasis comes 16 years after the last DCD album, Spirit Chaser.  With majestic tones abound, this is typical DCD fodder.

Had I continued the Music Project last year, this album would not have featured, because, despite the embargo on new music until the project has finished, I couldn’t resist when it was on offer on Amazon. I treated myself during the hiatus.

I really like this album. If I was still 23 and living in my crumby bedsit playing computer games all day long, I’d more than likely have played it over and over again had it been released then of course.

Theres something about DCD. Something naughty. I don’t mean boobies naughty. I mean…hooded monk/candles/pentagrams naughty. To me it’s like I’m invoking long forgotten entities from some dark sexy place populated by leather catsuit clad comedy inflatable breasted succubi doing dances like that silhouetted woman on the opening titles of Tales from the Unexpected.

Probably why I like it.

 

 

Dead Can Dance

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Jul 9

Album #68 – Amused to Death – Roger Waters

by stegzy

Screen Shot 2014-06-03 at 15.06.11 Amused to Death – Roger Waters

I don’t know what it is about pissed off rock musicians. They whinge and moan about society and how hard it is and how corrupt and awful people in power are. Then they jump on their yacht and sail off into the sunset to their mansion in Cuba or somewhere.

Being a bit of a Floyd fan I was recommended Amused to Death by my hippy friend Blair who always had a good music recommendation that would tickle the old conspiracy tentacles.

Waters moans about the influence of media and television on society and war.Saw him live once though. Think the smile on his face at the end of the concert said the most. It was a kind of “Thanks for your money suckers!” look.

Maybe I miss the point. Media only has the power it has over people because we let it. These days, with the power of media in our own hands, we perversely continue to suckle on the teats of our media mummies rather than actually getting out and making our own media. Like writing a blog. Or making a film. Or singing our own songs. None of which will necessarily make you a living unless you’re really good at it, have the right face and you know the right people.

If you like being angry and helpless to do anything, this is the album for you. If you don’t like being angry, do something about it.

1992 Pink Floyd Roger Waters

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Jul 8

Album #67 – Among My Swan – Mazzy Star

by stegzy

Screen Shot 2014-06-03 at 14.54.23 Among My Swan – Mazzy Star

At school I was known as Mazzy S by some of my colleagues. Never really asked why. I just accepted it and moved on.

One day someone said “Ah Mazzy S, like Mazzy Star”. I queried them and they explained that Mazzy Star was a band. I asked if they were progressive rock and got told that they weren’t. So there ended my interest in them.

Spin forward a few years and Mrs-Soon-to-Be-Ex-Gnomepants mentioned that she liked a few songs by Mazzy Star. So here was my chance to find out what they were like.

Imagine being really depressed. At that depressed level where you are sat in a bar on your own staring at your shoes and wishing the world was a nicer place. Then imagine the bar owner getting really upset at you not buying any drinks and to get out of the place as he doesn’t open for another five hours or so.

Well Mazzy Star is like that.

Cold. Uncaring and shoegazery. I am not a hipster.

Mazzy Star

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Jul 7

Album #66 – Amarok – Mike Oldfield

by stegzy

Screen Shot 2014-06-03 at 13.56.10Amarok – Mike Oldfield

Oldfield presents a miasma of sound harking back to the wild days of Ommadawn in this release from 1990.

I remember asking Steph Ormsby to nip to HMV for me to get this on cassette because I was stuck in school and I simply had to have it.  Bless her, she did and I’m eternally grateful to her for doing so.

Without Amarok, the next 2 years would have been difficult expression wise. I could hear how Oldfield had vented frustrations against Branson and Virgin while at the same time marvelling at his musical prowess and wishing I was just as talented.

Of course, I’m not.

Presented as a single sixty minute track, something that was lost by listening to it on cassette, Amarok is a true experiment in your own understanding of musical form. I especially like how the ending just keeps building up and up. Theoretically, you could listen to it on loop for a whole day.  I do, however,  recommend that you listen to it when feeling a bit…eclectic.

These guys did a good job of performing it too:

1990 Mike Oldfield

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Jul 6

Album #65 – Amanda Palmer Goes Down Under – Amanda Palmer

by stegzy

Screen Shot 2014-06-03 at 13.36.42Amanda Palmer Goes Down Under – Amanda Palmer

Amanda Palmer, formerly Dresden Dolls, strums her stuff in antipodean climes. A clear difference from previous works under the name of Dresden Dolls but still an unmistakable sound.

Palmer is totally independent. She produces her own records, writes her own songs and markets herself through whatever medium she is able to. The record companies that tried to make her censor her body are probably spitting globules of regret like baked beans.

Angry lyrics interwoven by sleek musical passages and accompaniment, APGDU is a nice intro to Palmers work if you like your introductions live and hairy. There are no “greatest hit” tracks on the album nor are there any rehashes of studio stuff. Enjoyable.

 

Amanda Palmer

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Jul 5

Album #64 – Always Got Tonight – Chris Isaak

by stegzy

Screen Shot 2014-06-03 at 13.17.14Always Got Tonight – Chris Isaak

One more day, is all he asks for in his first track of this album.

Isaak returns to form in this 2002 release.

As already discussed in the previous Isaak album entry, 2 Metre Sessie, my love for Mr Isaak’s music stems from my youth. Back in the day, I had moved from regular visits to HMV to relying on friends and the internet for my music information. So it is probably no wonder that I didn’t come across this album until several years after it was released. And what a shame it was that I did.

Had it been released in the nineties I probably would have given it more attention but by the time I had come across it I was preoccupied with home making and Scandinavian operatic rock. So as a result it sat in my music collection unlistened to for some time.

Isaak’s unmistakable sound reverberates through this album like a stick in a metal bucket. It’s full of good lonesome tunes bemoaning the breakup of undiscussed relationships, extolling the virtues of being in love and being America. American Boy the tenth track on this album featured heavily in Isaak’s television show which, for reasons unknown, was shown too late in the night to be noticed by me. Thus I listen to this album and feel guilty about not being a true fan and staying up until ungodly o’clock to watch his escapades.

 

Chris Isaak

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Jul 4

Album #63 – All Over the World – Electric Light Orchestra

by stegzy

Screen Shot 2014-06-03 at 11.52.16 All Over the World – Electric Light Orchestra

The Very Best of, apparently.

I really liked ELO when I was a kid. I suppose the tweeness and the optimism of their tunes lent some colour to my otherwise plodding teens. I can recall listening to them (on cassette of course) while doing my evening newspaper delivery round, whistling and singing away.

The selection of tunes here are what I’d probably pick if someone said: “Do us a compilation of ELO like”. But there are a few tracks I would have added that aren’t on this mix. I often wonder what goes through the head of people who make compilation albums like this. What makes them decide “Oh this is a banging choon, lets ‘ave that one on like” and yet neglect to put a song that is far superior in quality? I will no doubt explore this further when writing the reviews for the numerous Best Of compilation albums that will feature in this project.

Curiously, it wasn’t until recently that I actually found out what lead singer Jeff Lynne looked like.

Beards.

Says it all really.

 

1980 ELO

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Jul 3

Album # 62 – Alive – Omnia

by stegzy

Screen Shot 2014-06-03 at 11.38.17Alive – Omnia

Somewhere in the mists of the mind exists a world of beardy weirdies playing hurdy gurdies and singing about fauns, elvenfolk and witches.

Somewhere in my record collection, here in fact, that world is recreated in sound.

Omnia class themselves as Pagan Folk and its not difficult to hear why. This is the type of music that has clearly evolved from the unity of Goth and New Age. Or morphed out of some Emo/Tweecore/Folk fusion.

I first came across Omnia while looking for a lesser known band Omniac . I never found more than I already knew about Omniac but instead my ears were treated to harps, traditional percussion and hurdy gurdy backed tunes with bearded weirdies reciting neofolkesque lyrics. A joy to behold!

So if you’re ever thinking of holding one of those happy gatherings in your leafy glade of a living room or back garden, this is the music you will want piped through.

Omnia

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Jul 2

Album # 61 – The Album – Various Artists

by stegzy

url-1The Album- Various Artists

Short of stealing a TARDIS and traversing the wibbly wobbly, time travel is a bit difficult. However, you can mitigate the lack of ornate chez lounges or blue police boxes by slapping on a good old compilation of music from the period to which you want to travel.

And that’s exactly what this album does. It transports the listener to the heady days of the late nineties and early noughties.

There are just as many artists I’ve never heard of on here as there are artists I have. Immediately I am there, mooching about Liverpool in the mid to late nineties wearing my scruffy jeans. Neo-Socialist optimism oozing out of the ground in a pre-911 hedonistic carefree era.

Bands such as Blur, Creed, Manic Street Preachers and Top”We now play at village fetes”loader strumming away in that plastic coated faux indie scene soundscape created in antithesis of the cheezy and garish eighties soundscape.

Not a bad compilation for long journey in the car. Or for when you’re writing one of those gritty dramas about young people flat sharing in the mid 90s early noughties.

 

Various Artists

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Jul 1

Alapalooza – “Weird Al” Yankovic [#60]

by stegzy

_Weird Al_ Yankovic - Alapalooza Alapalooza – Weird Al Yankovic

Two posts today. Why? Well, I hate to spoil the illusion but I’m not just listening to one album a day, I’m listening to several so at time of writing it is June 2014 but confusingly, the previous and the preceding entries were both written in May 2014.  Even more confusingly, there is actually only one post today not two.

Why?

Well, firstly, since I started this project I have swapped over to an Apple Mac meaning that my previous music manager of choice, J River, won’t work unless I fork out a wedge of cash for the Mac version. Which I’m not going to do.

J River and ITunes both sort music differently. J River puts all the albums starting “The” down with the Ts, while, ITunes does as it pleases.

Secondly, although I am now an Apple bastard, I still use a windows laptop. So when I came to write an entry today I thought I’d check the running just to make sure everything is on track.

It’s not.

I seem to have missed a couple of albums which haven’t shown on my Mac. The first being Aeon and the second being this one. There are a few others, but I don’t care about them so in the interest of not having to muck about in the back end of this blog, I’m not going to cover them here and will delete them anyway.

Unless this happens again, or an album I really like is missing from ITunes, I will just stick with the alphabetised ITunes library.

So, Alapalooza. What’s it like? Well, it’s typical Yankovic fare. Spoofing McArthur Park (Jurassic Park), Red Hot Chilli Peppers and Aerosmith. Some amusing moments, some not so.

I can never be entirely sure how I feel about Weird Al. Some of his stuff is very clever, other stuff just feels forced or strained. This is one of those that sit in the middle. It helps if you know the music he’s taking the piss out of I guess.

 

1993 Weird Al Yankovic

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Jun 30

Album # 59 – Aion – Dead Can Dance

by stegzy

220px-Dead_Can_Dance-Aion_(album_cover) Aion – Dead Can Dance

Take one bag of illegal herbal substance.

Add several goths.

Stir with plenty of velvet.

Stew for the duration of the album and you will experience neoclassicalist dark wave at its full.

This was the first DCD album I ever bought following a night at a very wild goth filled party in Liverpool during the 1990s.

Do you know that album people always say changed their lives? Well this is the one for me. Everything musical I’ve bought or downloaded since I heard this album is a direct result of having listened to this album.

Short of wearing black, moping about and smelling of pachulia; listening to Aion is an experience. You’ve more than likely heard most of the tracks anyway on documentaries or in trailers for films involving some sort of  mediaeval jiggery pokery.    Tracks that stand out include Fortune Present Gifts Not According to the Book, Saltarello and Black Sun.

Much like Blood Axis’ Absinthe, this album has accompanied me on trips into somnambulistic realms following surgery or late night meditative chats with Shamen. But not with the added unease that Absinthe brings. Aion is one of those Guardian reader type “Coffee Table” albums like Buena Vista Social Club. 

So much so, if you want to be a hipster, get this, then tell everyone how dated it is once they too admit to owning a copy.

Dead Can Dance

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Jun 29

Album #58 – The Age of Plastic – Buggles

by stegzy

images The Age of Plastic – Buggles

Video, apparently, killed the radio star.

I don’t know what to say about that.

I’m sure video will have a fair trial and execution.

This is Buggles’ first album. Famous for its second track, Video Killed the Radio Star,  frequently cited as the first popular music video. Of course, anyone that knows anything knows that the first music video was My Little Stick of Blackpool Rock by George Formby, but what do I know eh?

After you listen to VKTRS and replayed the mental image of some tinsel wigged dancer in a tube, you might as well turn this CD off.

Buggles

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Jun 28

Aero – Jean Michel Jarre [#57]

by stegzy

urlAero – Jean Michel Jarre

Do you remember the 1970s? Do you remember those pristine vinyl records your elders kept lovingly in their sleeves. Tentatively taking the black discs out of their paper sheaves, popping them religiously onto the turntable and carefully lowering the stylus onto the run in?

Do you remember the smell?

Do you remember?

Jean Michel Jarres music takes me back immediately to that time. I can still hear the hum from the badly earthed amplifier, the smell of the vinyl and the visualisations of the mind where I’m transported from the chintz filled sitting room to the far off reaches of outer space.

You know the type of outer space I mean don’t you? The kind that resembles cosmic Mathmos lava lamps. Nebulae, misty clouds of cosmic matter, blipping and blopping (yes they are actual verbs). The kind of outer space that wouldn’t be amiss from a remake of Barbarella or some science programme with Jonny Ball. The kind of Roger Dean outer space with weird aquatic astral creatures and bloopiness.

Aero, is a kind of “Best of” revisited. Nice if you want to relive the cardigan wearing, garish carpeted childhood of the 1970s. Nicer still if you just want to pop some acid with your hipster friend while staring at their Mathmos glooping and shlooping about on the table.

It’s kind of thought provoking that this music evolved into Air.

2004 Jean Michel Jarre

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Jun 27

Album #56 = Aeon – Terra Sancta

by stegzy

Terra Sancta - AeonAeon – Terra Sancta

Lots of long sustained chords with an eerie apocalyptic feel to it. The kind of music that might play when hell breaks loose and you’ve taken something you shouldn’t have.

Terra Sancta

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Jun 26

Music Project – Album #55– Adventures in Modern Recording – Buggles

by stegzy

AdventuresInModernRecording Adventures in Modern Recording – The Buggles

More than likely, if you’re over 25, you’ll probably be familiar with The Buggles. You’re probably also aware of Trevor Horn and his production skills. If you’re a Yes fan, you’ll probably also know of Geoff Downes and Trevor Horn’s brief stint as members of the progressive rock supergroup.

If not, you’ll probably go “meh” and skip over this entry. Adventures in Modern Recording is the Buggles’ “difficult” second album. I have the 2010 remastered re-release. Two tracks from which stand out, I Am a Camera, which is a reworking of Into the Lens from the Yes album Drama, and We Can Fly From Here which was later reworked by Yes and appears on their album Fly From Here.

As with all second albums, it’s nothing groundbreaking. It’s a nice to have if you’re a Yes fan or you happen to be curious about The Buggles having just heard Video Killed the Radio Star.

Buggles

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Jun 25

Actual Fantasy – Ayreon [#54]

by stegzy
Ayreon_-_Actual_Fantasy


 Actual Fantasy – Ayreon (1996)

The second Ayreon album in this project.

This is a really good album. I really wish the UK made more out of our European cousins music. There are some really good bands over there and had I been aware of Ayreon in 1996, I would probably have bought this album then.

Think hair. Lots of hair. Think synth. Lots of synth. Think rock guitar. Lots of rock guitar. Add a sprinkling of Jeff Wayne and you have Ayreon.

The album is like a compendium of short stories with each song telling a tale about some weirdness involving time travellers, computer zombies or fantasy worlds where books can kill.  If you like Jeff Wayne, prog or your songs to tell stories, then this is one artist you cannot afford to ignore in your life. The best song, in my opinion, is Abbey of Synn which has a catchy tune and a chorus that will lay ear worm eggs in your mind.

1996 Ayreon

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Jun 24

Achtung Bono! – Half Man Half Biscuit [#53]

by stegzy

folder Achtung Bono – Half Man Half Biscuit

This is the third HMHB album in my collection and their tenth album. Released in 2005, it features the 2010 Radio 6 fan favourite. Joy Division Oven Gloves. Without trying to sound like a hipster, I was listening to this album before 85% of the people who came to discover HMHB because of that song.

So there.

Ner…

Some of my all time favourite HMHB tracks appear on this album including Asparagus Next Left, Restless Legs and Letters Sent.

As with all HMHB, brilliantly observed and cutting.

2005 Half Man Half Biscuit

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Jun 23

ACD – Half Man Half Biscuit [#52]

by stegzy

ACD - Half Man Half BiscuitACD – Half Man Half Biscuit

This is the second album alphabetically that I have from Half Man Half Biscuit. Released in 1993 , ACD is a typical HMHB album. Sardonic wit, cutting observational humour and wry stabs at those members of society that tend to annoy.

I remember hearing about HMHB when I was in my early teens and thinking that they were an inspired band. By the time I managed to get most of their albums, they had already been going for several years. I’m sure that had the internet been available when I was 14 I would have been able to find their albums a bit better than I did back then.

Nigel Blackwell, the lead singer, has a very typical Scouse sense of humour. The kind of “I’m alright because I’m not like you” kind of attitude that hard-nosed meat heads in dodgy Scouse boozers might have. The kind of looking down your nose at a society that thinks it’s better than you because they have trips to a caravan in the Peak District yet you can only afford a day trip to Rhyl. The kind of funny, quick-witted individual who would probably have yards of yarns to spin, none of which are probably true but may, just may, have a soupcon of truth in them .

Take this song for example…..

 

 

1989 Half Man Half Biscuit

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Jun 22

Accessories – The Gathering [#51]

by stegzy

Accessories – The Gathering

This is the second album alphabetically that I have from The Gathering. It is one of those filler albums. The ones that bands or record labels release to maintain interest in their music between albums. Accessories is a compilation of live, rare and b side songs.

Songs from Mandylion like Strange Machines, Amity and In Motion are joined by covers of Dead Can Dance (In Power We Trust the Love Advocated) and instrumental and orchestral versions of other classic Gathering songs.

I suppose it is one of my favourite albums by the Gathering, purely because it showcases most of their better songs. Spread over two discs, the playtime runs to just over 2 hours 25 minutes and is a good introduction to the band if you couldn’t face A Noise Severe.

2005 Gathering (The)

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Jun 21

Music Project – Album #50 – Absolute Beginners (Soundtrack)

by stegzy

Absolute Beginners (Soundtrack)

Absolute Beginners is one of those films you’ve either seen or not. But nearly everyone knows the title tune as performed by David Bowie.

I saw the film many years ago, some time in the mid-nineties when it was already old. The young plastic surgery free Patsy Kensit looking very tasty, the fresh faced Eddie O’Connell acting his socks off and even a bit part for good old Lionel “Give us a Clue” Blair. All mixed together by jazz and soul with a light dressing of British humour. It was no wonder it was a flop.

With artists such as Sade, The Style Council and even British stalwald Ray Davies popping up, the soundtrack is a rather good old toe tapper.

Whenever I listen to it I’m immediately transported back to my vane efforts to restylise myself as an independent batchelor in my crumby bedsit in the Wavertree suburbs of Liverpool.

I didn’t grow a soul patch. Nor did I start poncing around in berets and lounge about looking moody. So I guess I got off lightly.

Quiet Life – Ray Davies

1986 Soundtracks Various Artists

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Jun 20

Music Project – Album #49 – Absinthe: La Folie Verte – Blood Axis & Les Joyaux de la Princesse

by stegzy

Absinthe: La Folie Verte – Blood Axis & Les Joyaux de la Princesse

Absinthe

In days gone by, I would scour the usenet binary newsgroups looking for delicious audible morsels to shove in my ears and seem highbrow and cultured. People like my friend Nick seem to do it without blinking. They’d find a band nobody had heard of, proclaim them as the best thing ever, and bang on about how other people just don’t understand their message. Then, as the band becomes popular, they deny ever having liked them in the first place or proclaim that they’re not as good as they were when the drummer used Zillon drumsticks or whatever.

Hipsters I believe the youth of today call such people.

Knobheads, as we used to call them back in the day.

Oh but how things change.

I came across Blood Axis and Les Joyaux de la Princesse (LJDP) on usenet and immediately fell for their mix of poetry and atmospheric melodies carved from old wax cylinders and gramophone records. Genius.

Kind of like what Ibizan DJs do, but with 78s. And with atmosphere. And culture.

Absinthe is a brilliant work of art. It’s trippy, dark and very atmospheric. I’ve used that word a lot in this post. Atmosphere. Yes. If ever you wanted to know what atmosphere was, you should listen to this. I recall having it on my MP3 player when I was in hospital and thinking “If I listen to this when I’m tripping off my tits on painkiller/morphine I’ll have a right royal time!”

Yeah. I did. I was immediately transported to a Paris of dirty opium dens, unclean absinthe shops and moody Gauloises cigarette smoking in the 18th/19th century. I highly recommend listening to this alone, in a dark damp uncarpeted room during a rain storm. With only a rag for a curtain, a rickety table and an old wooden chair for company.

Blood Axis Les Joyaux de la Princesse

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