Turntable + vinyl + sofa + attractive (slightly tipsy?) female = the perfect recipe for a quiet night in.

This record was “designed simply and solely as a showcase – a shop window for a most attractive series of specially designed and recorded LPs. The wide variety of sounds and moods are a cross-section of the albums currently available in Mercury’s Super Stereo catalogue.”

Quincy Jones makes an appearance with his Big Band, and Peter Knight has a crack at orchestrating “Lovely Rita”, but the best track by a mile is “Tally Man” by Big Jim Sullivan, taken from an album called Sitar Beat, which I will definitely be keeping my eyes peeled for, though I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s quite a kitschy collectable among psychedelia fans.

Happy Thanksgiving! We hope you enjoyed Part I of “I am Thankful.” It is our prayer that you are celebrating with those you love and take time to give thanks to God for all He has done. Please let us know in the comment section below areas in which you are thankful.

Starr Cliff

I am thankful….for the internet.  My family lives far away, but through the power of technology they still get to “see” my kids grow up and stay connected.  My best friend serves the Lord in Japan, and only comes stateside once every two years, but we stay in constant touch through emails and blogs. And watching her kids grow up in pictures and on video is priceless.  10 or 15 years ago that wouldn’t have been possible!

Jennifer Riley

I am thankful for my husband. I don’t tell him enough or give him credit for all he does, but I am so glad God sent him. He loves God with all of his heart and has a genuine, mature spiritual relationship. We’ve had many trials and I would not want to face the enemy with anyone else. Each year Redbook magazine has a Hot Husband contest and I feel guilty each year I don’t nominate him. He is hot because he’s handsome, sexy, loves God and is an amazing dad. I love co-parenting with him and can’t wait to see how he’ll handle a daddy’s little girl. He’s got the father of a son down! And finally, I am thankful for his knowledge about programming and graphics. He is the behind the scenes guy for this blog–he’s been on call 24/7 for things I can’t figure out!

Our Wedding Day - October 2004

Meredith Mitchell

This has been a “special” year for my family in more ways than one.  To put it in the words of Charles Dickens, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…”  In the past 365 days, I have become thankful for second chances, and new beginnings.  As you can see my two oldest received a new beginning this year.  My husband was also baptized along with Allen Jr and Makaela.  Thank you Jesus for a second chance!  We have ALL been given a second chance.  I know what I want to do with mine; what will you do with yours?

Allen Sean Mitchell Jr.

Makaela Mitchell

Tina Pouslen

I, Tina Poulsen, am thankful for the conveniences & luxuries you see below.
I confess these things have now passed into the “can’t imagine living without” from the “nice to have” category.

And in case you’re standing in judgement (perhaps, rightfullly so) YES, I am deeply thankful for more important things like my healthy family.

“The Lord has done great things for us and we are filled with joy!” Psalm 126:3

(There; the scripture seems to balance out the shallow-ness of the collage.)
Happy Thanksgiving, Gals!

Gloria Toti

I am so thankful this year, probably more than ever, to live in a country where God is NOT an outlaw.   I never want to take this for granted.   I love entering the house of the Lord and expressing my gratitude to the King of Glory.   I don’t have to entertain thoughts of arrest or martyrdom.   I am simply able to worship with freedom.  So many fellow believers do not have this liberty.  When I am at church, I worship with all that is within me for the sake of those who have to worship in secret.   I know if they could worship in churches like we have, they would be so expressive.   If they are not allowed, we are. This Thanksgiving my heart is overwhelmed by the thought of what I would be willing to do if that freedom was taken away.   God help me to be as courageous in my freedom as other believers are in the face of their enemies.   Lord, I want to love you from the depths of my soul and make you known to those who live in darkness – I am so thankful for you.

~   Happy Thanksgiving to all of you girls in our Blog world  ~

If you are on Facebook, the theme this month was status updates reflecting what you are thankful. Our Blog authors decided to play along. We also ask our readers to share their thankfulness in the comment section below. We would love to hear from you!

Laura Fulkerson

Brie and Her Adoring Grandmother

I’m thankful for the gift of children. As my granddaughter, Brie and I danced around the kitchen this morning, I realized what an honor it is to be home with her. I get to keep her. I get to watch her smile and learn to talk. I get to see her go from laying in a crib to walking and dancing and leaping around the kitchen. I get to watch her first attempts at front rolls. It is pure joy to share my days with this beautiful child. I would not be anywhere else. God has blessed me with this gift, and I feel very rich indeed this Thanksgiving.

Amy Marrero (Spotlighted Reader 11/23/09)

I am thankful for so much. Space does not permit me to list every
blessing! Here are a few:

• The promise of eternal life through Jesus, my Savior.
• A husband who is less than perfect (most are), but is a man who is in love with the Lord.
• My two young precious sons who, by faith, are growing into strong Godly men.
• My parents, sister and brother. They love to have our sons sleep over every Friday, so that my husband and I can have “date night.”
• And being a stay at home mom (another blessing), this one is HUGE!!!!

The Marrero Family

Amy's Parents: Alex and Delia Reyna

Amy with her siblings (Alex and Lisa) and her mom Delia

Pat Stanton

I am very thankful for my parents influence.  they taufgt me to live with a grateful heart.  Gratitude is priceless!

Nita Kuehn

Kuehn Family 2007

We have established a tradition in our family that at our Thanksgiving meal, each person is given the opportunity to share a special way in which God has blessed them during the past year.  It really helps us, as a family, stay in touch with our core values and it also gives honor to whom honor is due.

As for me, I must say that I am especially thankful to the Lord for the amazing family of friends He has graciously brought into my life.  And to each of them I would say, “Thank you for loving me through the good and the bad; thank you for telling me the truth, even if it stings a bit; thank you for sharing God’s love with me in a very tangible way.  To me, you are more precious than silver.  Bless you.”

I generally hate cover compilations. Number one, it screws up the “artists” tab on my itunes browser and makes ipod navigation a pain, number two, you generally buy the set for 2 good songs, and the rest are filler done by bands that feature the nephew of the executive in charge of the compilation. But Morr Music has taken their roster of artists and knocked this tribute to the vibrant New Zealand music scene out of the park. I can’t tell you anything about the music scene of New Zealand either…i don’t know the history and honestly this is the first time i have heard these songs. What i do know is that entries by B. Fleischmann, Electric President, American Analog Set, ISAN, and all the others make this a compilation not filled with heavyweights, but several welterweights that you probably have heard of before. I’m not going to tell you what to like, but standouts for me are the title track “Not Given Lightly” by B. Fleischmann (i am unable to find the vocalist at this point), “You Forget” by Electric President and “Happy Chord Whore” by ISAN. Not to mention the “sufjan-esque” “In Case of Harmony” by It’s A Musical and the guitar driven “Kudos” by Surf City. Those are just a few songs, and i had trouble cutting down my “like” list to those 5. Like i said, i can’t give you the history of the original songs, (this blog is cool, but not that cool). What i do know is that this is 34 tracks of goodness, and enough gold dust to make you dig into the artists on the compilation as well as the New Zealanders who inspired it all.

1 / 2

Buy

- Dave

It’s Monday once more, and as I stare out yet again at the blustery, rain-sodden English landscape, time to break out some more of those exotic sounds of yesteryear, but this time with an emphasis on big orchestral arrangements of the Latin/Mexican/South American numbers. Nevermind that, if you actually visited most of these places today, you’d be dodging bullets in drug-gang controlled warzones to a soundtrack of gangster rap – just give me The Mexican Hat Dance, The Peanut Vendor, Tequila, and all those old rumba, samba and bossa grooves, as performed by the orchestras of Roberto Delgado, Erwin Halletz, Bert Kaempfert, Ray Martin, Edmundo Ros, Mantovani and others…

Wow, just as I’m finishing up this post, the sunshine suddenly breaks through the clouds. That’s the power of music for you!

After months of work, I’m about ready to share what I believe will be a 12-volume compilation and a fantastic follow-up to Ladies of the Eighties …

No, not The Modern Dance by Pere Ubu, I’m afraid. This one is K-Tel’s stab at a New Romantic collection from 1981. The spirit of the Blitz Kidz taken to it’s ultimate commercial conclusion. Oh how Steve Strange, Rusty Egan and their gang of dandified misfits must’ve laughed…or cried…

The big compilation labels of the period from roughly ‘75-’83 were K-Tel and Ronco. Both labels seemed determined to avoid using ‘cheesecake’ photos of dolly-birds on their sleeves, perhaps to distance themselves from those cover version collections perpetrated by labels like Hallmark and Contour. So instead they dreamed up all sorts of visual concepts to entice passing trade in the music department at Woolworths. Some were a bit rubbish, in fact nearly all of them were. But some were kinda fun too, and this post offers three examples from the early ’80s with a distinct emphasis on sci-fi/adventure/movie imagery.

I feel sorry for the kids today…all they have are those boring downloads, or maybe a ‘Pop Party’ CD if they’re lucky. But imagine how much more exciting it would be to get one of these babies in your Christmas stocking?

Another commendable MFP release from the disco era. From a pop culture perspective, the 1970s was actually a game of two halves. The first few years were really just an increasingly overblown/comical/desperate extension of the sixties. It took the combined impact of punk and disco to propel the seventies into it’s own orbit, clearly illustrated by the kind of releases that budget labels like MFP started putting out from that point onwards.

This one collects all the essentials from Munich’s Silver Convention, a studio group produced and arranged by Michael Kunze and Sylvester Levay, fronted by three fine ladies called Penny McLean, Linda G. Thompson and Ramona Wulf, although that line-up changed a couple of times as girls came and went. Y’see it wasn’t about personalities; the girls provided a functional role – they merely needed to look good and sing a few lines in basic unison. The lyrics were always basic too, often just the title repeated several times, and certainly nothing as complicated as a verse. It was all about the production, “a totally fresh approach to the disco idiom, adding rich, classical rooted strings and pulsating synthesisers to a style based in soul music”, as stated by Roger St. Pierre (contributing editor of Disco International Magazine) in his sleeve notes, also claiming that it was Silver Convention, rather than Giorgio Moroder,  who were responsible for breaking down the barriers and popularising Eurodisco, at a time when disco was “seemingly the exclusive preserve of black Americans”.

Well I don’t know how much of that was hyperbole, but I do know that those big hits like “Get Up And Boogie” and “Fly Robin Fly” remind me of some good times in my childhood at Oldbury Court Youth Club, and the lesser-known tracks are pretty tasty too. Unfortunately, Roger’s final assertion that Silver Convention’s “future looks bright” turned out to be incorrect. As far as I know, they never did anything else of consequence after this.

Kitsuné is probably one of the sickest labels around. From music to clothing to design, they’ve got a number of things on lock. I’ve only been following the label since the 6th compilation, so I might not have the history as some of you, but in my opinion this 8th compilation is the bees mf knees.

The Kitsuné Maison Compilation 8 dropped digitally out in Europe yesterday (November 16) and is now available for everyone else here. The comp offers up a ton of good tunes from the likes of Siriusmo, Midnight Juggernauts, Heartsrevolution, Two Door Cinema Club (amazing new Kitsuné signee), Moulinex, Harvard Bass, Delphic, Memory Tapes, Crystal Fighters, etc etc etc.

As you can probably piece together, this thing is stacked and it would really be a shame to not pick up a copy of the album for yourself. I’ve been trying to figure out which tracks to denote as my “favorites”, but it’s proven difficult, as every song offers up something tasty. However, I can safely say that the new Heartsrevolution, Delphic, Two Door Cinema Club, Logo and My Tiger My Timing tracks are up there on my list.

Get a preview of the compilation here and buy a copy here.

Tracklist:
01. French Horn Rebellion – Up All Night
02. The Drums – Let’s Go Surfing
03. Siriusmo – High Together
04. Le Corps Mince de Françoise – Something Golden
05. Midnight Juggernauts – This New Technology
06. Heartsrevolution – Dance Till Dawn
07. Logo – Junocide
08. Two Door Cinema Club – I Can Talk (Moulinex remix) (original)
09. Slagsmåklubben – Brutal Weapons
10. Beni – Maximus (Harvard Bass remix)
11. AMWE – Friction Between The Lovers
12. Jolie Cherie – Star
13. Chew Lips – Salt Air (Alex Kapranos remix)
14. Delphic – This Momentary
15. Memory Tapes – Bicycle
16. Parallels – Find The Fire
17. Nottee – Control
18. Crystal Fighters – I Love London
19. My Tiger My Timing – I Am The Sound

Kitsuné Maison Compilation 8

Beats™

Want a sneak peak at the songs being considered for A Slight Trance of Snow (official name for my annual holiday season dance, trance, and electronica compilation)? Check out the playlist featuring the top contenders on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=1AC6C93D915260B2

In the world of cinema, there may be myriads of great actors, directors and their greatness, which I don’t know of, but here I present my favourites. That, in my opinion, has changed the shape of the world cinema in one way or the other and influenced the later generations. They are the absolute Landmark and most influential collaborations since the phylogeny of this species called Cinema.

Robert De Niro with Martin Scorcese

There is a blazing diversity of astounding partnerships between the Directors and the Actors, in the history of cinema. In the event of those listed below, it almost appears that any one name can be questioned or cast off, also because of its subjective nature. For instance, John Mills was in more of David Lean’s films than Alec Guinness, but I believe that, in the chefs-d’oeuvre that Lean and Guinness made together, each artist was vitally necessary for the other to do his best work, and the films they made would have suffered without the presence of both. Similarly, Max von Sydow was splendidly Ingmar Bergman’s male lead of choice, but I would reason that Bergman’s collaborations with Liv Ullmann unveil the deeper talents of both director and actor in ways that neither could match alone.

I invite you to put forward your own selections, if there are any – or to vote down mine – in the Comments section.

With that in my catastrophic mind…

In no particular Order:

1. Martin Scorsese / Robert De Niro
2. Ingmar Bergman / Liv Ullman
3. Akira Kurosawa / Toshiro Mifune
4. Jean-Luc Godard / Anna Karina
5. Federico Fellini / Marcello Mastroianni
6. François Truffaut / Jean-Pierre Leaud
7. Alfred Hitchcock / James Stewart / Cary Grant
8. Luis Bunuel / Fernando Rey
9. Francis Ford Coppola / Al Pacino

  10.  Jean-Pierre Melville / Alain Delon

  11.  Satyajit Ray / Soumitra Chatterjee / Sharmila Tagore

  12.  Elia Kazan / Marlon Brando

  13.  Woody Allen / Diane Keaton

  14.  David Lean / Alec Guinness

  15.  Sergio Leone / Clint Eastwood

  16.  John Huston / Humphrey Bogart

  17.  Gulzar / Sanjeev Kumar

  18.  Coen Brothers / Steve Buscemi

  19.  John Ford / John Wayne / Henry Fonda

  20.  Steven Spielberg / Harrison Ford

Just like Gigi, I started creating music compilations to share with friends. Here is volume 2 of my Movement Project music mixtape series. If you missed out on the release back in September and want some chill music to kick back to or to take on a long drive, simply download the entire album by clicking the link below. My mixtapes are inspired by a diverse collection of artists and various genres of music. These are made especially for music junkies, like myself, and music lovers with open minds – as well as a gift for all those who have supported my Movement Project the past year. I am always on a constant quest to discovering new artists, rare remixes and tracks as well as re-introducing memorable songs back to memory. Watch out for volume 3 to come out real soon. Enjoy!

http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/1737599/Mixtape2.zip

An abslutely bloody fantastic LP – capturing a label both in it’s infancy and totally on the ball – with a collection of artist at the top of their game.   I bought this when it came out originally in 1978 on Stiff Records (GET 1) – and here it is ….

Totally played to death back in the day – still in mint condition however due to being well-handled over all these years ….  one of my total all time favs this !!

So – damn good to find another copy – this time the re-issue on the mighty MFP label.  A few very very minor differences in the track lengths – and the sleeve notes differ on the back – apart from that – nothing much differs.

I never got round to catching this tour – however saw most of them subsequently …   and what a damn rabble they are for sure .. ..  highlights for me as always are Wreckless Eric and the mighty Larry Wallis and his Psychedelic Rowdies – although for sure there is not a single filler on the whole thing ….

The LP finishes with every single one of them performing the staple Sex Drugs Rock and Roll – brilliant stuff ….

En esta ocasión, la recopilación no empezó por una canción, sino por la portada. Estaba repasando las fotos que hice los últimos meses y me topé con la que he utilizado para este disco. La retoqué un poco, elegí un nombre y, de ahí, surgió Prince y su Sign ‘O’ The Times.

Después, todo fue ir encadenando canciones, hasta que con el Mr. Suit de Wire se cerró la enésima recopilación que os dejo en el blog: una selección de temas más indie de lo habitual (con toques pop, punk, new wave, etc.) y muy entretenida desde mi punto de vista.

Haz clic en la portada para descargar Modern Times

Prince, Young Marble Giants, The XX, Giant Sand, Pavement, Stephen Malkmus, Iggy Pop, The Wave Pictures, Papas Fritas, Violent Femmes, Patti Smith, The Pastels, Nick Lowe, The Stranglers, Kashmir, Sebadoh, Wolf Parade, The Undertones, The Polyphonic Spree, The Raveonettes, Tegan & Sara, The Breeders, Veruca Salt, The Manhattan Love Suicides, Frank Black y Wire son los cantantes y grupos que he incluido en Modern Times, que, como siempre, os la podéis descargar pinchando en la imagen de la portada.

AQUÍ tenéis el listado de canciones. Espero que os guste.

P.D.: La foto es de una tienda de juguetes y objetos antiguos que está en el barrio de Chueca.

Karen Dalton

Todos los sábados leo el ABCD (el suplemento cultural del ABC) y una de mis secciones favoritas es la columna de Félix Romeo, en la que siempre descubro a nuevos autores y libros muy interesantes. En esta ocasión, bajo el título de BANDA SONORA, leo: “Me dicen: «Se llamaba Karen Dalton y es a la música lo que Carson McCullers a la literatura». Bob Dylan cuenta en sus Crónicas (Global rhythm) que la conoció a comienzos de los años sesenta y que se sintió inmediatamente fascinado: tiene una voz como Billie Holiday y toca la guitarra como Jimmy Reed. (…/…) Su voz suena antigua, como de disco de piedra, y sus blues cortan como un cristal roto con violencia. Murió de sida en 1993, a los 55 años, tirada en las calles de Nueva York, después de demasiado tiempo enfangada en el alcohol y en las drogas.“

Karen Dalton en el Herald Tribune

Después de leer ese párrafo, lo único que podía hacer es localizar las grabaciones de Karen Dalton. Sus discos de estudio se reducen a dos: It’s So Hard To Tell Who’s Going To Love You (1969) y In My Own Time (1971). Más tarde se editaron Cotton Eyed Joe (2007) y Green Rocky Road (2008), que recogen grabaciones en vivo y caseras de 1962 y 1963.

Karen Dalton, cantaba y tocaba el banjo y la Gibson de 12 cuerdas (personalmente me quedo con las canciones con guitarra). Tocó un par de veces junto a Bob Dylan en el Cafe Wha? Su segundo disco lo produjo Harvey Brooks, que trabajó también con Bob Dylan, Miles Davis, etc., y Fred Neil fue el más importante apoyo en su carrera. Seguía los senderos del blues y el folk, aunque también tenía escarceos con el pop y el sonido Motown (siempre llevándolos a su terreno). Es junto a Fred Neil, Richard Tucker o Dino Valenti, parte de aquel grupo de fantásticos artistas folk del Greenwich Village.

Haz clic para descargar la recopilación de Karen Dalton

En la recopilación que os dejo en esta entrada, he incluido temas de los cuatro discos. Los 13 primeros corresponden a las grabaciones de estudio, mucho más accesibles que los últimos 9 temas, que son de los discos que recogen las grabaciones caseras y en vivo del 62 y el 63. In My Own Time es, aparte de más accesible, el disco mejor producido y más elaborado, y en el que toca más estilos musicales (hay mucho menos folk). Espero que lo disfrutéis.

Haciendo clic en la imagen de la portada os podéis descargar las canciones y la carátula en pdf. Y AQUÍ tenéis el listado de temas (ordenadlos por año para tenerlos tal y como están en el listado).

Karen Dalton - Something On Your Mind