John Lydon sat for a freewheeling interview this week with DJ Christian O’Connell of the UK radio station Absolute Radio. Among the topics discussed during the 16-minute-plus session were: Lydon’s upcoming UK shows with Public Image Ltd.; how Lydon came from a working-class background and how the sense of community that he felt during his formative years is missing these days; how Lydon’s UK TV commercials for Country Life Butter funded the PiL reunion and that he was accused of being a “sellout” because of it; how Lydon and his wife were booked on the Pan Am 103 flight that blew up over Lockerbie, Scotland in 1988 but changed their flight before going to the airport (and how Lydon’s family, unaware of the flight change, thought that they had perished); and that Lydon is planning a larger-scale PiL tour for 2010 if he can obtain the necessary funding. Lydon is always a fantastic interview subject.

To watch a video of the interview session, go to the Absolute Radio site or click below:

Lydon will be hosting a two-hour show on Absolute station Absolute Xtreme on Sunday, December 6th from 8 p.m. to 10 p.m. GMT (3 p.m. to 5 p.m. Eastern). More details can be found here.

They are celebrated as great vocalists, but can the likes of Bob Dylan and Tom Waits really sing? Neil McCormick writes in the Daily Telegraph:

Bob Dylan: “A voice like sand and glue” in Bowie’s memorable phrase. Contrary to what many of his critics would assert, Dylan actually sings in tune but his harsh, barbed-wire timbre & attacking delivery has been inspiration for every tone deaf poet with a guitar. But with songs like these, who cares whether he can really sing or not?

Lou Reed: His half talking, half singing drawl with the Velvet Underground created a new rock template.

Tom Waits: Started out gruff and soulful but deliberately ravaged his vocal chords with whiskey and cigarettes to sound older and more lived in. In the history of vocals, I am not sure anyone has ever done more with less.

Johnny Cash: Even as a youngster, his voice was shaky and low, but he sang in time and in tune and like he had lived every word.

John Lydon (Johnny Rotten): His ranting style, high and tuneless, led the attack of the Sex Pistols then took us on dub metal journeys with Public Image Limited.

Ian Dury: Unrepentantly cockney speak-singing, frequently completely flat but utterly alive in the playful lyrics.

Leonard Cohen: A low, shaky monotone that has, somehow, grown in authority even as it reduces in range.

Nick Cave: A stiff baritone beset by tuning problems, Cave invests his apocalyptic blues with spine chilling conviction.

Siouxsie Sioux: A lone female entrant on our chart of errant singing stars, Siouxsie’s limited range and gravelly tone only added to her lustre as la grande dame of punk and goth.

Jarvis Cocker: OK when he keeps it to a whisper but as soon as he sings out he turns into some tuneless geek in a karaoke bar, which perfectly suits his vignettes of ordinary life.

449

“You can’t censor language. It’s our greatest, greatest achievement.” – John Lydon

Here’s my 3rd show, that  looked at the work of dub/ambient/world music pioneer and ex-Public Image Limited bass player, Jah Wobble.

Picture: courtesy 30Hertzrecords

The show is called “From the Other Side of the Mirror” and will be broadcast every Monday at 3pm. You can find KOOP radio at 91.7 Fm in the Austin area, or stream it online at www.koop.org

The idea behind the show is pretty simple. Each week the show will focus on a song, producer, label, musician(s), venue, etc. that has a major influence on music, their fingerprints are everywhere, but are forgotten or under most people’s radar. I will help listeners connect the musical dots. Like a documentary for your ears if you will. I will tell their story and showcase the various music they have created or been involved with.

Subject was Jah Wobble. Playlist is below;

1. Swan Lake – Public Image Limited/2nd Edition
2. Invaders from the Heart – Jah Wobble/The Early Years
3. What Will you Say – Jah Wobble/Without Judgement
4. Visions of You – Jah Wobble/Rising Above Bedlam
5. Hit Me – Jah Wobble/Heaven and Earth
6. Solitude – Jah Wobble/Chinese Dub

No offense Tim, but I think John Lydon would have made a far superior Mad Hatter.

Hardend Regards,

JV.

Public Image Ltd. are to reissue their seminal 1979 album ‘Metal Box’ to coincide with their December reunion tour.

As well as releasing a new ‘metal’ version of the album as a three-CD set for the first time, a 64-track, four-CD rarities version of ‘Metal Box’ – dubbed ‘Plastic Box’ – will also be released. The ‘Plastic Box’ edition of the album features rarities including the band’s John Peel sessions and remixes.

Both releases come out on December 14, with the original album appearing in remastered form.

The news comes as John Lydon and co gear up to begin their first UK tour in 17 years, which kicks off on December 15 at Birmingham’s O2 Academy. Lydon has also confirmed that if the band make enough money from the forthcoming tour, they will enter the studio together to record new material.

John Lydon admitted in an interview with the Camden New Journal that the money he made from the television commercials that he did for Country Life Butter helped fund next month’s UK tour by Public Image Ltd. Lydon said, “The money I got from that advert is the advance on this [the PiL tour].”

In the interview, Lydon defended himself against criticism of being a “sell out” by doing the Country Life Butter commercials. He stated:

“Why are they questioning me? What manual am I supposed to adopt? I’m promoting a British product which I’m very proud of. Anything I can do to help British industry is fine by me and in return you’ve got PiL.”

For more on this story, see the article from NME.com.

PiL’s UK tour starts on December 15th in Birmingham, England. There’s no word yet about possible American dates.

To watch one of Lydon’s TV spots for Country Life Butter, click below:

John Lydon at his 45 Gunter Grove pad, by Janette Beckman. John had bought the Victorian terrace with his minute earnings from the Pistols and in 1979, the house was also being occupied by Keith Levene (downstairs) and Dave Crowe (in the bit you walked through to get upstairs). The upstairs living room was under constant reggae bombardment and the fridge was always well-furnished with lager, while John held court amongst friends and hangers-on. John: “I love visitors. They are here for my amusement.” Gunter Grove was also home to cannabis, speed and the smidgen of heroin, and drug raids were common. One ironically took place in February ‘79, on the rare occasion when PiL had gone to bed before dawn. After smashing through the front door and ripping up the floorboards and John’s mattress, the police found nothing. Still, John was escorted to the police station and ended up having to walk home in his pyjamas.

The Chelsea set: Public Image Ltd boys, Jah Wobble, Keith Levene and John Lydon, at Gunter Grove, 1979
By Janette Beckman

It seems the creepy John Lydon dreams I kept having a few months ago were actually a portent of impending “giggage” – as Public Image Ltd have reformed and are performing in London this December.

So a couple of days ago I went out and bought a couple of tickets to appease the Lydon dream-demon.  Lets hope he leaves me alone now.

I do like PiL, and I’m really looking forward to the gig.  I just really hope that they play a variety of their earlier punk / experimental sounds as featured on the first few albums, Flowers of Romance, Metal Box and First Issue, and not so much of the dross from later in the band’s career.  Such as the hideous ‘dad rock’ sounds from the album That What is Not – which are enough to make a girl soil her bondage trousers in distress.

Anyway, probably best I end this entry on that unappealing note.  Here is some 80’s – tastic PiL to point your eyes at:

With guest John Lydon.

2nd November 2009

Tracklisting:

Pizzicato Five — Twiggy Twiggy Vs James Bond
Athlete — Black Swan Song
Donovan — Season Of The Witch
Cosmo Jarvis — She’s Got You
LaBelle — Lady Marmalade
Smoove & Turrell — Beggarman
The Beatles — Getting Better
Squeeze — Is That Love
Paolo Nutini — Pencil Full Of Lead
Public Image Ltd. — Annalisa
Public Image Ltd. — Four Enclosed Walls
Travis — Driftwood
The Gadsdens — The Sailor Song
Simon & Garfunkel — Scarborough Fair
Mumford and Sons — Winter Winds

So its Friday morning and I should be working on important things in the church office, but instead I find myself scanning the internet for news ahead of tomorrow’s North London Derby.  Whilist doing so I can across an article of famous fans from both teams and thought it only appropiate to have a face off.  Who has the best celebrity fans?  Arsenal or Tottenham, Tottenham or Arsenal?

Round 1:

*

First up its overly smug Simon Cowell wannabe Piers Morgan for Arsenal against everybody’s favourite straight talking businessman Sir Alan Sugar for Spurs.

This one is an obvious win for Tottenham.  No questions.  Aint no one gonna mess wit the Sugar, specially when its the hard to like Piers Morgan.

Arsenal 0-1 Tottenham

•••••

Round 2:

*

Next up, its former S-Club 7 hottie Rachel Stevens for Arsenal against the former Mrs Liam Gallagher Pansy Kensit for Spurs.

For me, the average man on the street would opt for Stevens everyday.  Even though Kensit seems like a lovely person and Stevens appears to lack a big dollop of charisma, I’m gonna be shallow and go for looks alone.  To which Rachel gets my vote.

Arsenal 1-1 Tottenham

•••••

Round 3:

For Arsenal: former Mr Darcy and all round British acting treasure Colin Firth versus ladies favourite Hollywood actor Jude Law for the Spurs.

A tricky one this.  Firth is favourite amongst housewives across the country, whilst most people have a liking for Law.  Purely on the basis that Jude has been a lifelong Spurs fan where as Colin only become a gooner after portraying one in the fil ‘Fever Pitch’, its got to be Law.

Arsenal 1-2 Tottenham

•••••

Round 4:

*

*

For Arsenal: The very loveable, and frankly wasted on the X-Factor, Dermot O’Leary.  For Spurs: Twinkley eyed coffin dodger Bruce ‘Nice to see you to see you nice’ Forsyth.

Although Brucie is a bit of a legend, he is also annoying and a bit too old school.  Where as everyone loves O’Leary.  The man was a legend on Big Brother’s Little Brother and is a fine ambassador for Arsenal football club.

Arsenal 2-2 Tottenham

•••••

Round 5:

For Arsenal: Cheeky chappie, former Jonathan Creek and Stephen Fry wind up merchant Alan Davies.  For Tottenham: Everyone’s favourite, floppy haired posh comedian Michael McIntyre.

A real tough one this.  I’m a big fan of Davies, because of Jonathan Creek and his general brilliantness on QI.  However, you gotta love McIntyre.  The man is a comedy legend.  So its a draw, or as X-Factor would say ‘DEADLOCK’.  I am tempted to go for Davies as he’s more outspoken about supporting Arsenal, but I feel a draw is a fair result.

Arsenal 3-3 Tottenham

•••••

Round 6:

For Arsenal: irritating anarchist and former Sex Pistols frontman John Lydon.  For Tottenham: Actor who famously played West Ham supporter Alf Garnett.

Appararently, when he’s not advertising butter or ‘fighting against the system’ Lydon is following the Arsenal.  But he’s still a plum.  So it has to go to Mitchell.

Arsenal 3-4 Tottenham

•••••

Round 7:

For Arsenal: New romantic ‘rocker’s Spandau Ballet.  For Tottenham: Soulful crooner Lemar.

Lemar has the aura of cool about him, where as the Ballet have numbers in their favour.  Purely because of Martin Kemp and Tony Hadley, its got to be Spandau Ballet.

Arsenal 4-4 Tottenham

•••••

Round 8:

So the decider goes down to these two.  For Arsenal: world’s most wanted man and all round Western hating cave dweller Osama bin Laden.  For Tottenham: drummer, musician, slapheaded gentleman.  Its Phil Collins.

When he wasn’t hating the West, bin Laden was enjoying its entertainments and famously went to see Arsenal play twice.  Collins is apparently a lifetime Spurs fan, although i’m pretty sure he also supports about 9 other teams including Man Utd so I’m tempted to go for another draw.  But then I remembered that bin Laden wants me dead where as Collins just wants me to buy his record.  So its has to go to Collins and Spurs.

Arsenal 4-5 Tottenham

So there we have it.  Apparently Spurs have the better celebrity fans.

Today is the thirty-second anniversary of the release of Never Mind the Bollocks, the Sex Pistols’ most famous, highly influential, and ONLY official studio album. So to commemorate the anniversary, this week’s playlist is a compilation of songs paying homage to the Sex Pistols and their affiliates.

FEATURED PLAYLIST: Never Mind the Bollocks. M.s Playlist for 28 Oct 2009

1. *World Destruction – Time Zone feat. John Lydon & Afrika Bambaataa

2.   My Way – Nina Hagen

3.   Madame Butterfly – Malcolm McLaren

4. *This is Not a Love Song – Nouvelle Vague

5.   From Beyond the Grave – Sid Vicious

6. *Submission – Sex Pistols

7.   Who Killed Bambi? – Edward Tudor-Pole

8.    Order of Death – Public Image Limited

9.   *I Wanna be Your Dog – Mephisto Walz

10. *New York – Opium Jukebox

*Available on iTunes

M’s Prior Musical Chairs Playlists: M.’s Halloween Playlist 14 October 2009 playlist

Musical Chairs’ Playlist Library: LITTLE MAGAZINE’s Music Page
Musical Chairs’ Video Playlist Library: LITTLE MAGAZINE’s Video Page

Enjoy!

Musical Chairs is a collection of weekly playlists created by selected artists, DJs, and musicians for LITTLE MAGAZINE. For guest DJ inquires, please send M.LittleMagazine@gmail.com a description of yourself, including a bio and musical tastes.

GOAL!

WANKER!

Jonathan Jones, “How Dada Spawned the Art of Anarchy,” Guardian Art and Design Blog 29 September 2009

“…Punk and dada, across the decades, share a savage hostility to the security and luxury of artistic respectability. The true anti-artist is never interested in compromise: for Lydon, to class the Pistols as high art was to tame them, contain them. This same anti-art rage is exemplified by Gustav Metzger, whom I interviewed recently, and whose concept of “auto-destructive art” is yet another variant of modern art’s impulse to smash reality.

This impulse to destruct, efface, obliterate cannot be confined to a single kind of modern art. There is as much negation, as icy a contemplation of the void, in the Rothko Chapel in Houston as in any dada collage.

This is why [Greil] Marcus writes so well about dada and its legacy, because he sees its bitter, liberated heart and does not take for granted what it was. It is also why to dismiss “anti-art” tendencies today is to be blind to the way they permeate the entire history of modernism — in short, to be a stuckist.”

****

Jonathan Jones, “Gustav Metzger: The Liquid Crystal Revolutionary,” The Guardian 29 September 2009 (p. 19 of the Arts section)

“…In the 1960s, his argument that destruction is a form of last-chance creativity in a terminal world had a subterranean influence — not least on Pete Townshend, who was Metzger’s student at art college and credits him with inspiring the Who to destroy their instruments. …

In 1974, Metzger called an Art Strike: for three years, from 1977 to 1980, he refused to make, sell or exhibit art, or to promote himself as an artist in any way. …

Today, at the Serpentine, I ask him why he invented auto-destructive art, what he meant by it. ‘It was a summing up of my entire life until that period,’ he says, in the German accent he has never lost. ‘It was my childhood in Nazi Germany, coming to this country as a refugee, as a survivor. And then when we had peace, the entire planet being transformed by nuclear weapons. That is at the centre of my life.’ …

Of watching the [Nazi] parades, he says now: ‘Certainly the brutality of seeing 10,000 people marching like machines — as a child I must have rejected it.’ Did it make him the artist he is? ‘It could be that I saw so much power that I needed to get rid of it in myself. That’s one way to understand the origins of auto-destructive art. In Judaism there is a tradition of rejecting power: the Prophets rejected power. That was part of my childhood, giving up rather than acquiring.’ …

You could say that Metzger is the Kindertransport’s greatest failure: instead of building a constructive life for himself in postwar Britain, he invented a destructive life — or a destructive art. His art is a refusal to forget, to assimilate, to move on. His anger at the world is almost that of an alienated child: he tells me that, in a photograph he once showed me — of a child holding his hands up during the liquidation of the Warsaw Ghetto — he sees himself: ‘I identify with this child.’

Violent art is Metzger’s response to a violent world. In his exhibition, that same Warsaw photograph will be shown concealed behind a barrier, like the other images in his series Historic Photographs. These are his most enduring and remarkable works: you crawl on your hands and knees across the images as a way of remembering what happened. …”

Link to the Gustav Metzger exhibition at the Serpentine Gallery.

The old pantomime dame is at it again – he obviously hasn’t been chastened by reading this blog. Not content with making us cringe at his awful butter ad, and a meaningless Sex Pistols reunion Mr Lydon has now reformed Pil to “celebrate the 30th anniversary of the release of Metal Box.” .

Amazing. Lydon, Wobble and Levene finally back together to perform the seminal album that defined post-punk.

Sadly not.  According to the official Pil website, Johnny boy will be joined by “ex-band members Lu Edmonds and Bruce Smith , plus new recruit Scott Firth” . Lu Edmunds and Bruce Smith both have fine musical pedigrees but the fact is they ain’t Wobble and Levene.  Another rock n roll swindle.

I remember seeing Rotten drag a bunch of American session musicians on a UK tour in the late 80’s playing Pil by numbers. It was dire.

I also remember seeing Wobble and Levene joining forces with Skip McDonald and Doug Wimbish of Tackhead for a sound-clash in the early 90’s. Despite terrible PA problems on the night, this felt like a real event. A one- off happening worthy of the hype.

The fact is, the original band were greater than the sum of their parts. The Sex Pistols were all about the sneering snarling frontman, but Pil was always a more sophisticated beast. Wobble’s baseline dub and Levene’s eerie scratchy guitar were as integral as Lydon’s voice, creating edgy paranoid classics. Careering and Poptones sound as good today as they did all those years ago.

Yes Pil made decent records without them – This is Not a Love Song and Rise - but Metal Box was, along with 1979’s other monumental release Unknown Pleasures,  an epoch defining album.

Jah Wobble has retained his integrity and made some great music post Pil, always collaborating, always experimenting. His work with Holgar Czukay and Bill Laswell stands up to anything he did with Lydon. And his recent Chinese Dub work shows he’s still happy to embrace different cultures and influences.

Lydon on the other hand has been happy to rest on his fat arse and his laurels for nigh on 30 years. Pil-lock.

This week, we have a landmark moment in the history of British TV.

On December 1, 1976, at the height of the punk revolution, The Sex Pistols appeared on Today, an early-evening TV news magazine programme presented by Bill Grundy that was broadcast live.

Grundy was renowned as a hard-drinker. The Pistols and their entourage had been left in a green room with a very well-stocked bar for hours before their interview. The resulting three minutes of TV rocked the foundations of the television industry. Remember, this was 1976, early-evening TV, and there had only ever been a couple of cases of swearing, late at night, on TV before then.

The show only aired in London, on the regional ITV network, but it made headlines around the world. The incident all but killed Grundy’s TV career and Today was cancelled a couple of months later.

The interview still pops up fairly regularly on nostalgia TV shows and documentaries about censorship but usually only in the form of edited highlights. Here is a rare, complete version of the interview that someone pieced together from various sources, hence the variable visual and audio quality:

Here is segment from a BBC3 documentary that discusses the incident:

And here is footage with a voiceover from some of the Pistols:

Finally, I’ve mentioned before that people tend to forget that The Goodies had a satirical element to their comedy, mixed in with the slapstick and surrealism. This little clip demonstrates it beautifully:

John Lydon (a.k.a. Johnny Rotten en Sex Pistols) quiere resucitar Public Image Ltd (a.k.a. PiL). Lo que significa que tras 17 largos años de “imagen pública” en el congelador, la cuenta bancaria del icono punk ha debido quedarse ídem… ¡Todo sea por la pasta! Pero de la que viene de las Islas Cayman, que la italiana engorda.

Claro que en el escenario sólo estará él, porque los miembros originales de la banda no se han sumado a la iniciativa… o igual no han sido invitados ¡Uhmm! Vaya usted a saber.

Y nada de “pajillas mentales” entre los que todavía guarden sus mallas negras “revientavenas”, porque del Lydon que en el 79 bramara espumarajos contra el establishment, la monarquía y el clasismo británico queda ya poquito. A sus 53 “tacazos”, “Juanito Podrido” ha declarado en The Guardian que los jóvenes de hoy son “demasiado ruidosos y agresivos” (¡?) Como diría su primo, Paco Pil: : ¡Viva la fiehsta!

 “This Is Not a Love Song”

For Christmas, I bought my daughter an iPod.

My wife seemed mildly surprised that I would buy an iPod for a seven-year-old (eight in April), but I didn’t see where I had much choice. My daughter has already outlasted her first portable CD player, a SpongeBob SquarePants model, and I saw no reason to invest once more in a “hard copy” disc-based technology that will surely have all but disappeared from store shelves by this time next year.

It’s a bright pink iPod nano, and she seems very happy with it. I also purchased an elegant little iPod-compatible boombox radio, for her room. I loaded up the iPod with a “starter set” of about 75 or 80 songs, and we all managed to be content with ourselves until April, when my daughter started asking for a cellphone.

Still, though, I experienced a small pang of regret, even as I was wrapping the iPod and boombox in Christmas paper. See, I own an iPod myself. I’ve already encountered first hand how an iPod changes the way you relate to music. So I knew that my daughter will never experience music the way I did when I was in my teens and 20s and 30s.

*

Some people have dreams about falling. Or having their teeth fall out. Or that dream
where you’re back at your old high school, dreading an exam on a subject you know nothing about, and you realize you’re naked.

I have dreams about record stores.

In my record-store dreams, I walk into a store and I feel that old sense of optimism and suspense. What’s new? What will I find today? Often, there’s something odd about the store. It’s a weird hybrid of a dry cleaners and a record store. Or a Motor Vehicle Department slash record store. Or it’s in an unusual place, like behind an old girlfriend’s parents’ house.

The records and CDs are catalogued and shelved in a peculiar manner. Not quite randomly, but rather according to an arcane system that I can’t quite grasp. I snatch up a recording I’ve been seeking for years. I can’t believe I finally found this! And over there, what’s that? Are you kidding me? “Live at the Whiskey-a-Go-Go?” That band never once toured America, never mind doing bar-band gigs in LA. And over here? Outtakes on the ROIR imprint? No way! Everyone knows those master tapes were lost in a fire in Belgium.

And on and on. These dreams are happy dreams. Sleepy-time wish fulfillment of the sort that we are rarely afforded by our subconscious minds.

*

There’s a lot to be said for the iTunes shopping experience. Or Lala. Or some of the lower-profile music download sites. You can hear a 30-second snippet of every song. You can read album reviews from major publications, and testimonials from people who’ve bought the song before you. The sites themselves will apply their impenetrable marketing algorithms to your purchases and page views, and suggest other albums you might like.

As a result, I rarely buy a recording I absolutely hate anymore. This can be (and sometimes is) a good thing. But the sense of mystery, of suspense, of splendid endeavor contained in old-style record-store-shopping has gone missing. A noted music reviewer (Robert Christgau) once described the offhand brilliance of indie-rock stalwarts the Replacements. Their music, he said, is like “crashing into a snowbank and coming out the other side with a six-pack.”

That’s what record shopping was like. Even if, nine times out of ten, you emerged with nothing for your efforts but whiplash and shoes full of snow, that tenth time made it all worthwhile. You beat the odds. In fact, given the odds, you most likely had something that no one else had. You could lend it to a friend. Pop the best of its songs onto a mixtape for your girlfriend. Bring it to a party. Scout the music press and see when that band would be playing live in your area, usually at the bottom of a triple bill.

*

I have much less patience with music than I once had. Part of this, clearly, is a consequence of age. I have a lot more on my mind, these days, than whether or not such-and-such band is completely “selling out” by letting so-and-so hip-hop producer remix their new single.

Music itself has changed. I was a freshman in college in 1980. I’m old enough to remember when musicians were aloof gods (Jimmy Page, David Bowie, Jerry Garcia), protected and isolated by music publishing empires, whose seeming contempt for the marketplace was the cornerstone of their allure. I can remember the last, tail-end years of an era in which musicians (John Lydon, Lou Reed, Arthur Lee) really were outlaws, of a sort.

All that is gone today. Records, like books, are no longer money-makers in themselves. They’re entertainment content, and their true value lies in their application to other media, in other venues. They generate revenue based on being inserted into movies, commercials, sports broadcasts, ring tones. So, in a sense, we have more music in our lives than ever before. And much less music of real consequence.

Finally, too, I use music differently. I listen to music at work. Somewhat quietly. I listen to music when I drive. Quietly, if I’ve got the wife and kids in the car; less quietly if I’m alone. And I listen to music when I run or hit the weights in my gym. Often loud enough to cause people to look at me in mild amusement or consternation.

I’m never sitting, perched on the edge of my couch, devoting my full attention to a CD as it winds its way through 11 or 12 four-minute tracks. Not surprising, given my circumstances. But the weird thing is, I’m not alone in this. Kids aren’t listening to recordings this way, either. And I know why.

It’s the iPod.

*

Music doesn’t stay on my iPod very long. It has a short shelf life. I’ve owned two iPod minis, both of the 2GB, 1,000-song variety. I’ve never filled either mini, and I usually have considerable room to spare on the hard drive. I rarely listen to a whole album all the way through. And if I do, chances are, I’ll cherry-pick a track or two, convert them to mpgs, and move on. The old days, of having an album gradually grow on you, and reveal nuances over multiple listenings, seem like very long ago.

This isn’t because I don’t like music, or don’t own much of it, or don’t know much about it. There’s a room in my house that’s filled floor-to-ceiling with CDs on two walls. Even after dumping thousands of CDs (not to mention thousands more LPs) in used record stores and on eBay, I still own several thousand recordings, and many, many more in mpg format on my computers.

Even the tracks that make it onto my iPod don’t last long. I dump music off my iPod. Constantly. After a play or two or three, I find myself skipping a song, and then I dump it. Why is this? Because, I think, songs are ubiquitous. They’re anywhere and everywhere, whenever you want them. So, except in some rare cases, you don’t want them. It’s a variation on the old saw that your favorite song is always best when it’s heard on the radio.

Why? Because it’s there and it’s gone. It’s a finite, limited experience. It has exclusivity.

A surfeit of choice engenders, paradoxically, a reduction in desire.

*

I can remember going to the record store in the spring of 1980. Cheap Thrills in New Brunswick, New Jersey. It was a Friday and I had, maybe, sixty dollars burning a hole in my pocket. At that time, twenty hours times the $3.35-an-hour minimum wage, minus taxes, left you with about $60.

After much pained deliberation, I walked out with two records. The first, I can’t quite remember, though it may have been some Jethro Tull piece of crap. The second was London Calling, by the Clash. I knew nothing about the Clash, but I’d been taken by the dynamic guitar-smashing cover and bold graphics (which I’d learn, much later, were lifted verbatim from an iconic Elvis Presley record), and by the price. $7.95 for a two-record set.

Over the next year, that record became part of the soundtrack of my life. I wore my college roommate’s turntable needle to a nub with it. I angered people at parties with it. I’d come home after morning classes, wrap my roommate’s big bulky headphones around my head and listen to all 18 songs (19 with the mysterious uncredited track, “Train in Vain”) in order. London Calling became part of my identity. Clearly, I was not one of those heavy metal head bangers (this was the year of AC/DC, after all). And I certainly wasn’t a southern-rock redneck or (much worse!) a hippie.

I wore the two records themselves out in this order: Side 3 (Elevator …. Goin’ up!), Side 1 (The ice age is coming, the sun’s zooming in!), Side 4 (Everybody smash up your seats, and rock to this brand new beat!), and, finally, Side 2, (I’ve got my giant hit discotecque album, I empty a bottle and I feel a bit free!).

Sometimes, even today, on one of the first nice spring days in April, I’ll put that Clash London Calling CD in the car player and go for a drive.

*

I’m not one of those anti-technology Luddites who fear and distrust every new innovation. The advantages of the iPod, I’m sure, outnumber the other, less desirable effects. I can still remember trying to run in the park with the first of the 80s-era cassette Walkman units, the sound wobbling and warping in my ears with every step, despite Sony’s vaunted “shockproof” technology.

But the magic? I don’t know. I’m not sure that’s still there.

In my dreams of the record store, the supply is limited to a few shelves and racks; the cataloguing is frustrating and obscure. There isn’t even a wise old record store clerk on hand. But everything’s a treasure and every conquest is mine.

I can’t ask my daughter about any of this. She has nothing to compare her iPod experience to. And I wouldn’t want to come off like one of those old fogeys talking about how much better everything was when everybody had to haul their ice out of the river and wrap it in river weeds in the old ice house.

Later this weekend, I’m going to upload another set of 70-to-75 songs onto Abby’s iPod. Already, the songs currently on there are, I’ve been told, really old.

I know just what she means.

Still, though, she loves her iPod. Maybe some day, my daughter will write an article, similar to this one, about the Golden Age of the iPod, and how great everything was before everyone had music chips installed in their heads and Big Brother (or Big Music) beamed the entire catalogue of recorded music history into your ears.

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Dorian Lynskey, “John Lydon: PiL Lets Me Express Proper Emotions,” The Guardian Monday 7 September 2009 (Arts section, p. 17):

[On the subject of dub reggae] “For me, the best rock is not what you play — it’s what you’re not playing”.

John Lydon will be playing a five-date UK tour in December under the banner of Public Image Ltd. The tour marks the 30th anniversary of PiL’s second album, Metal Box. PiL has been on hiatus since 1992. Lydon told BBC 6 Music that his father’s death last year and his brother’s battle with cancer spurred him to revive PiL. Lydon said:

“It was a very harsh time for me emotionally and I started paying attention to Death Disco, the record I wrote about my mother dying.”

Lydon added:

“I’ve always been wrapped around some sort of emotional tragedy through PiL but also great joy. It’s a chance to express every single human emotion possible.

“Although the [Sex] Pistols is a most fantastic band to be a member of, there’s more going on in me than that.”

When asked about the set list for upcoming PiL shows, Lydon told BBC 6 Music:

“Anyone who’s ever been to a PiL gig knows that there won’t be anything that you’re familiar with. It just isn’t like that.

“There’s a whole wash of new material that I haven’t used yet but I will be doing some kindly drop-ins to some PiL anthems.”

Lydon said that he wanted former Slits drummer Bruce Smith and The Damned’s guitarist Lu Edmonds to perform with him on the PiL tour. Former PiL member Jah Wobble (John Wardle) will not be playing with PiL on the tour. When asked why, Lydon told BBC 6 Music, “John’s a great mate of mine but we see different paths for each other.”

The tour dates and locations are:

December 12: O2 Academy, Birmingham
December 16: O2 Academy, Leeds
December 18: O2 Academy, Glasgow
December 19: Academy, Manchester
December 21: O2 Academy, Brixton (London)

For additional information on this story, see the articles from BBC 6 Music, XFM London, and NME.com.